After a 1st full-length in 2007 + an ep in 2010 (both autoproduced), 'rituals" the sophomore album of shEver finally just came out through Total Rust rds - one year after its recording...
Existing for about 8 years, the musical style of this (all-female) quatuor from Switzerland has consistently matured over the years; this is certainly not just related to their developped musical abilities but from a rather basic Funeral Doom/Death at their beginnings, they have nicely gone through something thicker with more atmospheres and variations.
Sure the pace is still very slow, extremely heavy and despaired , plus songs are long, but I now hear more basis taken in Trad' Doom ("you're the mirror" especially) or eventually Sludge than anything obvious dealing with Doom Death Metal à la Mythic (often cited previously, which was an easy comparison considering the type of line-up but not really exact otherwise) or MDB and shit that's cool !!!
While the sludgy bass is maybe more omnipresent and crushing ("ritual of chaos" and "je suis née") and guitars sound more piercing ("souls collinding"), the overall is definitely more menacing at the same time, not just by the scary vocals of Alexandra which are reaching excellence when turning agonizing like on "ritual of chaos"(it's impressive how she seems to be strangled here... brrr !) but also by solemn, colder atmospheres which erased a great part of the monolithic aspects from previous stuff, for something still heady but fairly rich and soaring.
I'm really not sure that the label Death/Doom is still appropriated to the band, no offense to anyone but this style is pretty outdated for many people (including me), while the music of shEver is NOT outdated at all and is far more catchy than what this generally implies... If there's some bands to think about when listening those doomed ladies then Thorr's Hammer, Grief, St Vitus,Neurosis and Wooden Stake (for the creepy vocals and witchy moods) should give you a better picture of how amazing this band sounds...
shEver is a DOOM band, eying more or less seriously on some of its related genres that's a fact but in the structures and moods they are DOOM to my ears ! so forget all the boring cliches you could read or hear about them and give them all the attention they deserve ...
http://www.totalrust-music.com/
http://www.shever.ch/
https://www.facebook.com/shEverdoom
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