I got such a positive response from my Ras Algethi and Monumentum posts, that I thought I would throw out another heavy hitter, my personal fave next to Ras Algethi, Cultus Sanguine.
Momumentum leader, Roberto Mammarella goes by the name Aqua Regis in Cultus Sanguine, and with his involvement, you pretty much know what to expect from this Italian group; lush atmospheres, heavy heavy dread and oppressing sadness.
The band released only two full length albums, all of which are decent, but my favorite is this EP from 1995 released before any of their full length efforts.
Here we have the first band in what I call the Italian Doom movement. No, the movement is not documented or even real, it is just a little arbitrary designation I have for bands like Ras Algethi, Canaan, Neronoia and the like, and Monumentum were the first.
Roberto Mammarella was the main man behind Monumentum, but had help along the way with members of Ataraxia, Canaan... and oh, Roberto also was in the stunning Cultus Sanguine and owns the super awesome cult label Avantgarde Music.
This is Monumentum's debut album, they only had two full length albums, and is a good point of departure and blue-print for many bands to follow. You can hear this style aped and expanded upon by many bands even today.
The year was 1995. I was moving from Missoula, MT to Minneapolis, MN via a Greyhound bus, with little on me but my bass, a few items of clothing, and a CD Walkman. The ride was around 48 hours or so, if not more, and the landscape of Eastern Montana and North Dakota is nothing but barren, brown wasteland dotted occasionally with a gas station or small run down town.
A week or so earlier I had purchased the newly released RasAlgethi debut album through the Fullmoon Records catalogue. I bought it on a whim, never even being slightly familiar with the band at the time. Perhaps if I had known that it had affiliations with Monumentum, I would have been more prepared.
It was about 1am and I was in a ghost town populated by perhaps 100 people at the most called Oxbow, Montana, right at the edge of the MT/ND border and I put this album in my CD player. This is the closest thing I have ever had to a religious experience while listening to someone else's music. It changed me, it moved me, and every dead town, every slab of road kill, and every solitary mysterious light in the distance fit in with what I was hearing at each moment. I listened to that CD non stop until I hit Minneapolis, about 8 times in all.
Once getting settled in Mpls, I contacted RasAlgethi main-man, Mauro Berchi, and we have been friends ever since. Shortly after this album was released, RasAlgethi morphed into Canaan, and Mauro started the eclectic and awesome label, Eibon Records.
This album is one of my favorite albums ever, and one of the best and most convincing moments in doom metal. Period.
EphelDuath are a weird hybrid beast from Italy. They are strange amalgamation of metal and jazz, and on their earlier releases black metal as well. If you like bands like Cynic, Atheist, Death or that whole death jazz scene from Florida in the early 90's, you very well may like this.
To me "The Painter's Palette" almost sounds like what John Zorn would do to a death metal band if left in a room with them for a day. No doubt about it, EphelDuath is unique, even for experimental metal, and this is one of my favorites from them.
This album is their third full length album, and it was released in 2003. I never see any press or recognition for this band, and I think they are very enjoyable and succeed in being truly unique. Information HERE and download HERE.
