If there’s one country in particular that is home to some of the best black metal bands in extreme metal, it would be Finland. The Mist From The Mountains are a Finnish melodic black metal outfit that have created the most melodic, adventurous, mystical and contemporary style of black metal almost bringing back the mid to late 90’s including other artists from Borknagar, Old Man’s Child, Dimmu Borgir and Behexen in which this case this band have simultaneously shifted and expanded the music to become so fresh, original and the creativeness on this record is truly something that needs to be heard more than once. There’s energy, compassion, dedication and the amount of detail into writing this record not only have met with such great expectations, but the more I’ve dived deeper into the album’s contexts the better I’ve understood myself that not all black metal bands are about misanthropic, satanic and so fourth but The Mist From The Mountains’ vision in making such exquisite and beautiful soundscapes really comes to show that this is fine art start to finish.
Even myself can safely say this record is full of imaginative ideas and throughout the records secondary half, the songwriting and progression in having these songs bringing that folkloric and atmospheric sort of sound almost reminded me of a band say Falls Of Rauros where not only they’ve combined folk metal and black metal compositions, but Mist From The Mountains energetic presences and towering, yet nature inspired lyrical themes is really special in my eye. From the melodic black metal inspired melodies of tracks such as After God to the symphonic black, almost folky like arrangements of With The Sun And The Skies And The Birds Above, there’s some synthesizers well as amazing mid-tempo sections to balance out the heaviness and atmosphere to make these tracks feel comfortable and almost melodically driven at times where it almost gave me a Agalloch The Mantle type of melody where it brings these post metal timed signatures but keeping the instrumentals feel tighter and fiercer to make the listener strapped into a forgotten universe to appreciate the beauty and craft of these Finnish musicians to really solidify the everlasting narrations of this record. If you’re looking for a album to kickstart the new year in 2022, then Monumental: The Temple Of Twilight is definitely worth your immediate attention.
Overall Score: 9.0/10
Review by Jake Butler
