Mistress of the Dead  

Weeping Silence of the Dead

Ruin Productions 2006

Ultimately hope-crushing doom death ambience from this crypt dwelling Czech.  Though this album was released in 2006 it is just now reaching my ears.  I don't think I have heard such a morose piece of music in my life.  Each of the five songs is a perfected union of the likes of funeral doom lords Thergothon and more ambient black metal on the same plane as Xasthur or Velvet Cacoon.  Though Vlad uses guitars extensively, the songs' foundation are more from foggy grey synths that the guitars shudder and pound over the top of.  The title track is lurching along at an abysmally slow and methodical pace with deep guttural vocals that act more like an additional instrument as opposed to the mouthpiece for the band.  This is a blue print for all five tracks on this album.  On I've Brought You Flowers, the monolithic notes and chords break for some supreme and isolating desolation by using almost whimpering whispers and solitary piano notes.  Simple and stark echoing instrumentation opens the first 3-plus minutes only to settle the listener into a sorrow-filled stupor before a crushing wall of guitar smashes all remaining hope like a thousand toppling cenotaphs.  None of the songs truly stand out from one another.  Weeping Silence of the Dead is more like a single, hour-long piece of music consisting of five different movements.  If you like your Funeral doom to be devoid of hope, mercy and pity, for it to be so sad and somber that no rays of light or warmth dare venture within its confines, then Mistress of the Dead is for you.