Die längste Nacht

When I received the album of A Winter Lost I felt somehow weird as their previous release “Weltenende (2010)” had created a very negative image to me for the band and for their ability to compose music. So, the “German – speaking” Canadians, after three years, they release in November of 2013 their second full length album called “Die längste Nacht”. This album lasts for about forty six minutes and it contains twelve compositions. By listening to the album for the first time, to my great surprise, very few elements reminded me of the band that I had met with their first album. Of course the style remains the same harsh, atmospheric, frozen Black Metal that the band wanted to present us in the previous album, but now it present it to us much improved.

The three years that have passed, they have worked in a very positive way for the band which shows that it has matured regarding composing music and now it has realized what is this that it wants to play. Of course, all these don’t mean that their new album is good. So, here we will find harsh and cold Black Metal, mainly of medium and slow speed, with a lot depressing references and fast, frozen outbursts, while the epic references are not absent. The riffs are influenced by the Scandinavian school while the depressing feeling is delivered with the use of disharmonic melodies and monotonous, slow riffing. Here the listener will listen to some interesting riffs which will catch his attention as also nicely structured tracks like “In the Sign of the Hammer”. The tracks are not long (3:30 – 4:00 minutes) and in most of them the band has taken a lot of care of the structure, with smooth transitions from one riff to the other and from one feeling to the next one. However in this album too, the tedious, without inspiration riffs and the boring, with bad structure tracks still exist and they pull down whatever the band managed to build until then.

The guitars are harsh and cold, their sound is heavy and somehow dirty, while they are played without mistakes, they deliver with accuracy the feelings to the listener. The bass isn’t clearly audible, but it is present and it fills the compositions nicely. The drums have interesting lines with beautiful turnings and “full” sound, they give to the compositions the depth and the strength that they need. The vocals, that the woman of the band is responsible for, are harsh Black Metal vocals, very expressing, with changes concerning the style and the feeling, they deliver the lyrics with much passion and intensity. The production is bass and clean while the sound which is produced is quite solid and heavy and it fits to the style of the compositions. The mixture has highlighted the guitars and the vocals, putting the drums and the bass a little lower, but without that adversely affecting the quality of the compositions. The band for this album has written lyrics in English language too, apart from German which had been used also in their first album. The lyrics are contained in the cd and they speak about frozen nature and ugly psychological states.

Generally, A Winter Lost are showing great improvement in their second album and that is quite encouraging and to tell the truth somewhat unexpected, as I didn’t expect a band with so bad debut, to has such difference. However they haven’t even reached the mid of their musical maturation. This album too has the negative elements which don’t let the listener to enjoy the entire album but individual tracks of riffs. The positive is that the band begins to gain its own music identity and to work correctly so as to present a mentionable result. Listen to it before you buy.