"Atmospheric fields black metal", as the label Dusktone puts it. 'Mourning Wept beside Me' is this Californian act Lost Inside's fourth full-length album in two years' time. Lost Inside is basically this fellow Kold, who creates the music and performs all the instruments, except for vocals, which were this time around performed by Necromorg of Italian act Sterbenzeit.

The attached letter reads: "...The atmosphere it sets is perfect for any type of mood." Well, I certainly don't feel that this is cold, evil or barbaric, or suitable for moods like those. 'Bewildered' does not feel very bewildered at all. One melodic pattern is repeated over and over during six and a half minutes, with slight alterations here and there. The drumming is basic and the vocals are very much incoherent. There is no way understanding any of the words in this cavernous-sounding shrieking. Feeling that this song submits, every single time I hear it, is joy. I mean I don't feel joyous, but the song's vibe does. Now this is black metal?!

Fantastically named 'A Ghost among People' carries a sort of vibe and melody that reminds me of Summoning, but without any kind of austereness and majesty. The song is a tad more varying than the opener is, but the joyous (yes, again) main melody/riff is the only one sticking out in a nice way. Another finely titled song follows: 'Four Walls and a Restless Shadow'. Beginning with almost a lovely kind of melody, the song soon enters more metalic realms, but only to cause dullness. Boring riffs and unineresting performances is what the song is about. 'Like a Wilted Flower' tries to reach some kind of a comfortless state, and does not manage in that, but engulfs into blandness. The closer 'Feed on Tears' actually manages to sound sad with its old Katatonia-esque melody work and is one of those moments, that saves the album from being a big failure.

Soundwise this is very light (lower frequencies are absent), but also quite clean when considering it is black metal, or rather influenced by it. However, reverb is utilized, more or less. There are a lot of underlying nuances to be heard, so therefore I recommend this only for listening with headphones. The shrieked vocals are totally incomprehensible and additionally, bloody annoying. Gloomy cover art is beautiful and very, very moody indeed.

In all, there is not very much happening during any of the songs. Some are very repetitive, some not that much. Even though the first two songs and the closer have some interesting ideas, there are simply too many futile attempts of riff and song writing during these 42 minutes. And the album does not sound as it was an entity, but just various divergent songs put on a CD. I think I'm not on the same frequency as Kold is, but if you're looking for repeating, black metal influenced stuff, you're welcome to inspect Lost Inside.

Rating: 5- (out of 10) ratings explained

Reviewed by Lane
08/15/2011 21:15