Today it's Jean Sibelius Day, the grandest of Finnish composers, who helped Finland to create its national identity. It is also the day of Finnish music in general. I was thinking of writing a review today for something Finnish and had thought about this for years and years:

Sentenced from Northern Finland; one of the less happy bunch of fellas who were around from 1989 to 2005. They never hit any big success, but after they were gone. After their demise everybody's most loved Finnish band were Sentenced. To me, this is Sentenced's best album together with 1995 platter, the third one, 'Amok'.

The band had dropped almost all of their death metal trait when in 1996 they released the 4th full-length album 'Down'. Already with 'Amok' they started to broaden their sound with more rocking stuff, and 'The Cold White Light' is the zenith of that. Generally, this is one of the leading albums of favourite Finnish frame of mind: Gloominess.

Here, gritty rock and heavy metal are joined by gloom-schlager (nowadays e.g. Viikate are known for that). While it can be joyous in way of blackest humour, it always has that fucking dark cloud hanging over, or a noose swaying away to the beat. I know some people cannot stand this murky vibe, but some of us can be entertained by it; in the end, everybody dies, so why not enjoy it while it's possible?!

Opening with absolutely beautiful sounds of Finnish nature, acoustic guitar begins to play foreboding melody of 'Konevitsan kirkonkellot', a traditional Karelian folk song, it soon turns into heavy-as-hell doom rendition of the named song. It was a moment of "what this time, then???" Yep, that gloom-schlager driven rocking heavy metal; which I cannot put under gothic metal, really. Melancholic melodies, sometimes non-distorted and therefore reminding of Finnish zither, and big wall of torrential rhythm guitars, which are often open stringed. Surely there's palm-muted rhythms heard, but Sentenced were known for this looser style. It's often spiced with keyboards or piano, which are kept in the background. The song-writing is rather straight, more rock-based than anything else, and mostly faster rocking explosions, with a couple slower murky pieces. It's definitely not one-sided.

This is the fourth Sentenced album with Ville Laihiala on vocals, and he had grown into a fantastic exponent. His voice is deep, warm and somewhat battle-worn, which simply made this more convincing. All vocals are clean with some rasp in them. Another highly characteristic element is Miika Tenkula's memorable and absolutely original guitar solos. He composed most of the material, with some provided by other guitarist Sami Lopakka and Laihiala. Sturdy and solid, rocking backbone (no double kick drums here, sorry) was created by bassist Sami Kukkohvi and drummer Vesa Ranta (one of three forming members of the band, together with guitarists).

The lyrics mostly deal with death or unwanted life, with one love song (that was left to bands influenced, at least partly, by Sentenced, such as HIM, Charon and countless more). They are written in unique style, some very basic, but some poetry-worthy. Even though his cover is somewhat bland here, the booklet is filled with great photography by Vesa Ranta.

The album is loaded with huge amount of mood and fantastic melodiousness. That is, if you enjoy Finnish stuff. This sounds unique, and the punchy Hiili Hiilesmaa production strengthens it even further. 'The Cold White Light' was one of my favourites from these Northernmost Killers when it came out, and still is. If that's not a sign of a fine album, then what is? Essential Finnish metal music here.

Rating: 9½ (out of 10) ratings explained

Reviewed by Lane
12/08/2020 20:46