Mono
The Last Dawn & Rays of Darkness

The Last Dawn is underway and Rays of Darkness are falling over a Japanese quartet with a pair of albums on offer. A pair of albums being released on the same day, something that is a little unusual but at the same time it could be wise keeping the playing time of each album shorter than clumping it all together into one very long and possibly boring album. They do belong together like two chapters or two parts of a televised movie or something like that but one of the parts is darker and one is lighter. That latter is something shown when looking at the cover art of respective album, the artwork is the same but one is white and the other is black in its foundation.

At first glance I don’t think there is that much of a difference between the two, they fit together and it is very difficult to make out where one ends and the other takes over but in a while you get to notice the differences where the most obvious has to be the use of slow, raspy, growly vocals on the second part. But the differences are more than that, there are not orchestral influences and it is more dark and sludge-like in the Rays of Darkness album. The lighter album is The Last Dawn which is all instrumental and more melodic with painting-like musical landscape rather than dramatic weather and natural disasters over the same landscape. It is a deep story and the first part is deeper than the second, the second is like an anti-climatic resolution to an exciting story and I think that is really exciting.

The stories are told in 49 minute and 36 minute chapters of seven and four tracks, and they are brilliantly produced. So all is well then? I would say yes but there are some difficulties in this, while reviewing two albums like this you always risk to leave something out in order to average something out over two albums. So how do I approach it? Well, I did approach them one at the time at some times and in full at other times and I have found that when looking at the quality there is not much to chose between these two albums as they are equally good despite being diametrically different in one way and completely similar in another. It is a very solid production, both of these albums which offers a smaller insight of this band than we have seen in later days because they have been using grander arrangements and orchestras all the time. This time they tone it down and they become more intimate and more interesting.

I think this is a piece of musical art, dramatic and exciting. Two albums you can sit down and listen to for a long time just dreaming away to pastures greener and more interesting than what you have in your life right now. At the same time I think the albums both lack a bit of dynamics and they both lack a real strong focal point that makes you stop in your stride and take notice. So, it is good but i think the albums could have been better had the darker parts from the second part been incorporated into the first part without adding to the 49 minute playing time. I think that in splitting the albums into two parts they have made them both flatter than they should be if they wanted to be magic. It is partly magic and will most likely appeal to fans of the band and this kind of music.

The band whose mission was to create music in a way that it took you from bliss to bludgeon is kind of missing their point here as they make one album of bliss and the other of bludgeon instead of combining the two. But despite some minor flaws I would say that this is still a duo of albums that would be worth having a look at, you can’t really fault a band who thinks and makes things differently even though they do not fully hit the marks this time.

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