It’s the weekend! What better way to get it started than with the latest installment of “Funeral Doom Friday”. This weekly column looks to shed some light onto some of the darkest, most depressing, and discordant metal out there. Funeral Doom stems from the deepest depths of Death-Doom and Dirge music. Each week, the goal is to highlight some of the newest music or rediscover classic works from some of the earliest bands and originators such as Australia’s Mournful Congregation, United States’s Evoken, UK’s Esoteric and the Finnish Thergothon. Feel free to share your opinions and suggestions in the comments!
A while back, when Pantheist's O Solitude was featured, I made a mention of the band deciding to work on a new album that is now slated to be released in the early stages of 2017. Pantheist is making the shift back to their Funeral Doom expertise after moving in a more progressive direction in the latter years of their career. To help make the new Pantheist album more possible, lead singer and keyboardist, Kostas Panagiotou, released a new EP in June. With every purchase of this Chapters EP, the money spent on it goes towards making the new Pantheist album a possibility.
The Chapters EP features six songs which tap into a futuristic, cosmic aura that is fed into plodding Doom. Panagiotou has been brilliantly crafting this kind of music throughout his time in Pantheist as well as in bands like Clouds, Landskap and Wijlen Wij. Tracks range in length from four to 14 minutes, culminating in almost 50 minutes worth of music (which is relatively longer than most full-length albums). It features a number of guest musicians who contribute different instruments and sounds. These guests include former members of Pantheist and Wijlen Wij. The EP was actually mixed and mastered by Clouds bandmate and Yhdarl member, Déhà. The inclusion of all these creative minds helps to make Chapters as expansive as outer space itself. The EP's brightest moments include the album's third track, "Chapter III – Warping the Space-Time Continuum" and "Chapter IV – Controlling Fire & Civilization" which comprise the EP's two longest songs. They feature Kostas turning his keyboards into twisted organs and an echoing stream of vocals that shake the planets and open dimensional rifts.
Every moment on the EP is worth purchasing, though. Chapters not only financially supports future Pantheist efforts, but also brings a sense of excitement and anticipation for what Panagiotou and company could potentially create. Each purchase of the album also includes a free PDF copy of its concept story, "Events (or Professor Losaline's Extraordinary Journey Into the Unknown)". The Chapters EP can be purchased on Pantheist and Panagiotou's Bandcamp page for 4 euros ($4.46), plus you will earn the satisfaction of contributing to the return of one of Funeral Doom's biggest talents.
