At first, I thought our Alex wants to kidding me with this “Departure” CD from FOREST OF SHADOWS. “Why does this clown send me Dark Wave-CD?”, were my first thoughts. The opener “Sleeping Death” starts with clean, wailing vocals, a monotonous, clumsy drumming and gloomy piano parts and the first six minutes are very dragging until the tempo then starts to increase slowly. It sounds partly like a mixture of AMORPHIS in their “Tales From The Thousand Lakes” period, DREADFUL SHADOWS and PARAMAECIUM.

This is also the direction for all five tracks. Sluggish, gloomy, haunting and very calm parts change with brutal Metal elements and serve for an incredible tension. This album isn’t very diversified but it’s damn intense. There are some similarities to LAKE OF TEARS milestone “Headstones”, just listen to the instrumental “Black Dormition”, just beautiful.

“Open Wound” is a song, which could also please some OPETH fans. Not to forget is the title track, a fantastic hymn to darkness, just divine!!! (Online February 7, 2005)