Review: The Sun’s Journey Through The Night – Demo III

Introduction

The Sun’s Journey Through The Night returns with Demo III, a 3 track release written and performed by No One. If you are unfamiliar with this band, they are an ambient black metal band from England that first hit the scene in 2019. But don’t let the title Demo III fool you into thinking they are just finding their feet – they in fact have four full length albums out. Nor should you be fooled into thinking that due to it being a demo it would have poor production quality – it is in fact incredibly well recorded and produced to create a passionate piece of bleak black metal.

The band that first caught my attention at Fortress Festival 2023, and once again spurred my interest further at Fires of Alba Festival 2024 due to their captivating and theatrical live performances.

Demo III

The demo clocks in at just over 26 minutes, however half of that is taken up by an ambient piece in track 2, so if you’re not one for the ambient tracks that this genre of black metal often contains you’re looking at 13 minutes of fantastic music evenly split between the remaining two tracks.

Blue Fawn fades us in with downcast, slightly distorted synth before a drum roll leads us straight into blast beats accompanied with a guttural growl. 

The track is laden with that drum fill leading into blast beat combo, with a brief pause of silence at 2:15 before it all comes crashing back down, heavy as a ton of bricks.

Halfway through the track the drums slow down for a while, whilst the other instruments and vocals keep their desolate atmospheric sound going.

The synth returns heavier just before the four minute mark as the vocals stop and the guitars slow down – a brief calm before we return to that storm we are oh so familiar with, ending abruptly with the last note echoing out into the empty silence.

Abysm of Time is the aforementioned ambient piece. An organ accompanies a choir singing, with the sound compressed and muddied. This lasts for four minutes before the discordant drone begins. It sort of reminds me of Super Hans in Peep Show: “What we really need to do is create a powerful sense of dread. The longer the note, the more the dread”. At least there is no Cor Anglais to go along with it.

It becomes ethereal with lighter synths over the top, as the deep note of dread warbles away in the background. This remains for the rest of the track to just become an atmospheric surrounding to zone out to.

We Are Not Meant For Beautiful Things is the closer to the trio, and can I just say what a wonderfully relatable title that is, it truly resonates with me.

The layered guitars, the heavy drums, the reverberating vocals, it saturates you and brings you into a comfortless and lonely world.

This track also features a brief spoken word section, where the title is mentioned as a melancholic guitar slowly plays in the background.

And then we are back. The drums roll as the dissonant guitars ring out their distorted riffs, the harsh vocals being thrown out there angrily. A short echoing guitar interlude, a drum fill, and then blast beats kick us off into a heavy angst filled track where you can taste the bitterness and fury of No One as he weaves this anthem of agony and anguish.

Conclusion

For the whole album the vocals are low in the mix, but not lost and are more akin to shouting into a void of gnarled noise. I’ve mentioned the drums a lot, as they just really stick out to me in this release as being a focal point that I have just been drawn to. 

Overall the two main tracks have just gripped me over the release weekend and I highly recommend checking this demo out and hopefully it inspires you to check out more of the sorrowful tribulations of The Sun’s Journey Through The Night.

BMZ Rating: 9 out of 10; Excellent: This is a standout album with superb talent and creativity. It’s impactful, memorable, and likely to be celebrated within the black metal genre.

Supporth The Sun’s Journey Through The Night here: https://thesunsjourneythroughthenight.bandcamp.com/album/demo-iii

Your thoughts on Demo III by The Sun’s Journey Through The Night

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