Fen "The Dead Light" (2019)

I've been somewhat torn over Fen on their last few albums. This newest sixth installment further illuminates the opposing forces at play and which one I prefer. The music walks the line many Blackgaze bands do, a bleak serenity and beautiful chill of nature swoons, masqueraded by swells of unearthed darkness and shadowy aggressors. The two toy with varying degrees of enchantment but ultimately the plunges into the latter are lacking in charm. The bursts of aggression, shrill vocals and pushes of pummeling loose blast beats pale in comparison to the beauty the band conjure with sorrowful melodies. It is consistently the alluring lighter moments, stretching to gorgeous oozes of shimmering acoustic guitars, that entrance with cold soil, a rooted earthly grace of mother nature. In these moments the music is king.

In a typically progressive style the songs structures have them swaying between the two and as you can imagine their is a lot of the less favorable Black Metal but it somehow gets by as those dazzling bursts of moonlight grace a darkly landscape the group forge with their music. Occasionally visited by charming chorals of heathen clean vocals, I'm to often reminded of how much a drag the shrill shouts and screams become. When not paying too much attention the general atmosphere carries it by but its upheavals of melody are really its best component and so grabbing. It leaves me with mixed feelings as the album is fine in the background but when giving it full attention its metallic half fails to match the charm of its counterpart. It does however pull of the chemistry between ends ever so well on its closing track, a fine closer.

Favorite Tracks: Witness, Nebula, Rendered In Oynx

Rating: 6/10

Fen "Stone And Sea" (2019)

Years have passed since Dustwalker and Carrion Skies, two records I was keen to check out but felt far from the magic of their debut The Malediction Fields. Apparently I have been oblivious to their fifth full length entitled Winter, released a couple years back. This short, three track EP was just the right dose of music for my tasting. To no surprise Fen's sound is rooted in the period where Black Metal first diverged from its second wave and with earthly tones and naturalistic inspiration the trio conjure three tracks that play with a familiar theme of light and darkness, swaying between the two.

The mostly darkened avenues the music walks is rough and raspy, throaty howls yell over loose blast beats and gritty distortions that feel earthly and muddy in the mix. The production is raw with its crunchy guitars and muddy noise, the clashing cymbals cut sharply through but with a creek of chemistry to tie it all together. Its got a sloppy sound but that is the charm to some extent. Its earthly, human and perhaps mystical.

It has its heavy moments that conjure the atmosphere of natural wonder in the darkness of a moon lit night setting over forests and moors but the light upheavals mostly emanate from the peaking melodies that transcend the gritty foundations. The music builds to an eruption of triumphant lead guitar queued by clean and humbly imperfect vocal lines that break up the screams and howls, bringing in that uplift of light from an overwhelmingly darker and dusty sound across its span.

Its rises of the light are brief and infrequent but the overall structure makes for a charming midsection of acoustic guitars that usher in cultural roots. It should be pointed out that the EP is essentially one big twenty minute song. The opening 8 minutes blister through shrill and windswept bustling furies of energy and its mid section acts as an calm between storms. The third act infuses chunkier elements of groove and a bigger emphasis on the lead guitar that brings the song to its climax, one that is drawn out to the end. Its quite the epic piece of music and one I have fondly enjoyed! This more focused Fen is more to my liking.

Rating: 6/10

Fen "Carrion Skies" (2014)

Fen are back! With another record, for which as long as they exist, I will be interested in hearing. As I touched on in my blog of their previous album "Dustwalker", Fen are a group from England who's sound captivated me on their first album, but have since failed to spark a magic I believe they have within them. I walked away from Dustwalker with mixed feelings, their gorgeous sound of dark melodics, naturist beauty glazed in ethereal shoegazing is the perfect setting for wondrous, captivating music, but never a melody sticks in my mind or does their music leave me with something eternally lasting. Its always a rich, absorbing listen, but is momentary within the music. It's selfish, but I want something more from this band.

Every listen of "Carrion Skies" was a positive one, relaxing and naturist, it was exactly what I expected from them, but as I've already touched on, it feels like it could be something more. The band cruise through progressive epics that mostly last ten or more minutes, winding their way from riff to riff, through passages of melodics and inspiring ethereal indulgence, that often accelerates into traveling energy of blast beats, tremolo picking and rough, beastly screams, utilizing many traditional Black Metal and Post-Rock approaches in their own way. Its not until the track "Sentinels" that my ears perk up to a hazy melodic riff coarsing under dreamy vocals crying out "The sky is a sphere". Its a moment that stuck with me, but a lone one through sixty minutes of music id say is "doing everything right", but somehow doesn't.

There are many varying degrees of enjoyment with music, and to be analytical about it prompts many questions about the listener, the music, and what it all means. With an intrinsic imagination for music I can hear beyond the aesthetics, I hear the notes, the rhythms, in any form, but the artists expression is always the mystery to divulge. With Fen I feel their genius is one I hear, but perhaps I don't quite connect with it. Always enjoyable to listen to, but always leaves me feeling like something is missing. Whatever it is, I am clueless.

Favorite Song: Sentinels

Rating: 5/10

Fen "Dustwalker" (2013)

English Black Metal band Fen are a group who captivated my interest with their debut "The Malediction Fields" in 2009. Their sound stood them apart from other bands in the genre by incorporating some Post-Rock elements that gave them a range and diversity that was intriguing and progressive. The bands songs could span a range of moods and incorporate many heavy, or light and melodic moments with effortless fluency. Their sound is charactered by a strong theme of nature, the kind of cold unforgiving beauty the natural world can be without the comforts of the modern age. I saw this band live last year and was, to my surprise, rather disappointed, feeling their live show didn't capture what their recordings did.

Dustwalker failed to grab my attention at first. It wasn't until multiple listens later that I became more engaged with this record, what initially disappointed me is still quite apparent, it is fitting for the right mood, but in the wrong environment the music alone doesn't quite have the spark to captivate my attention. Sometimes it is hard to tell the difference between your own enjoyment of art, or the art itself. Maybe there is only the first, but on a long walk in the cold dark of night could this music reveal itself.

Rough around the edges, the albums production is straight forward and unpolished giving it a natural character, not low fidelity, but far from perfection. This plays great in melodic moments that get a hazy distortion from the instruments sharing the space together. The production sets the tone for this record that explores varied themes in long songs that progress through a dynamic range of heavy and melodic moments that are quite awe inspiring in the right mood. The vocals deliver an honest performance with clean leads that bleed the human element into these cold songs. Theres a few golden moments here and there but overall the songs do dull a little as they continually progress through mediocrity. Theres nothing terribly bad happening here, but it just falls short overall.

Favorite Tracks: Spectre, Reflections

Rating: 4/10