We’ve had a long wait for the follow-up to Glare of the Sun’s 2019 sophomore album, Theia. That was a record I liked quite a bit, giving it a place on my first year-end list here at AMG Industries. I admit that I thought, even then, that it was slightly overrated in our review. I will also admit that I can’t remember when I last listened to Theia until revisiting it as a precursor to diving into its successor, TAL. It probably wouldn’t get the same list spot today. However, upon revisiting, it is, as I remembered, a densely layered and starkly beautiful slab of progressive doom, dabbling also in the post-metal realms. Does TAL match the highlights of its predecessor or is it left in the shadows?
From the outset, TAL feels like Theia with all the dials turned up to 11. Where Theia dealt in shades, shifting slowly between huge doom riffs, post-metal melodic, and more, bridging the gap between mid-career Katatonia and Ghost Brigade, TAL is a more in-your-face affair. That’s not to suggest that Glare of the Sun has fundamentally changed its sound but TAL is packed with more immediacy and energy. Delicate instrumental passages remain (the first third of “Amnesty,” for example) but there is more purpose and endeavor to them. It feels like they are guiding you, rather than wandering and searching. There is also a much greater sense of grandeur at play on TAL. It just feels massive, with the heavy, progressive doom riffs still in play. However, they now carry a slightly more abrasive post-hardcore, Cult of Luna-adjacent vibe like the opener “Colossus.” In contrast, other parts border on a grand symphonic feel (the rest of “Amnesty”). The other thing coming through, particularly in the deep, sustained clean vocals on the likes of “Leaving towards Spring” and “Rain” is a strong Prey-era Tiamat feel. This balances some of the album’s mountainous heaviness with a much more introspective silkiness.
Glare of the Sun combines the elements of their sound to great effect on TAL. The back-to-back pairing of “Äon” and “Relikt” exemplifies this, with the former feeling like Clouds meets Slow, while the latter is a masterclass in progressive doom, tinged with that Ghost Brigade sense of despair. “Stonefall” could easily have been penned by Cult of Luna for Somewhere along the Highway, its textures and builds feeling both nuanced and cathartic. What the album does so well is to shift between these influences and genres, while retaining a sense of cohesion. Although closely related, these genres all have their trademarks and tells, which are not easy to mesh, without sacrificing an album’s flow. Glare of the Sun’s five-year absence has led to an album that feels much more confident in its writing, with both “Rain” and “Äon” vying for a place on a songs of the year playlist.
That said, perhaps managing that creative flow led to TAL being longer than it should be. Clocking in just shy of an hour, there is a lot to digest here and, because of its intensity, it feels more tiring to listen to in a single sitting than Theia, despite being slightly shorter. The vinyl version, which won’t include the final two tracks appearing on the CD/digital version, would be almost a quarter of an hour shorter, and much tighter for it. However, you lose the excellent “Horizon,” with “Amnesty” an anticlimactic replacement to close the record. The other track missing from the vinyl, “Storm of Light,” is less of a loss. It’s solid enough but forgettable, not matching the aggression or the subtle melodics of the rest of the material on TAL. Similarly, while “Leaving towards Spring” does nothing wrong, it fails to match the power of “Colossus” or the beauty of “Rain.” TAL’s production is very good, with an airy, balanced mix that gives prominence to Christoph Stopper’s very good vocals (both harsh and clean), without allowing them to eclipse the rest of the band.
I’m very pleased to see Glare of the Sun back and they’ve grown in confidence as songwriters during their absence. The immediacy TAL serves up, in contrast to Theia, is fantastic but it needed to be matched by just a bit more restraint. Cutting the likes of “Storm of Light” and shaving off a few more minutes here and there would have given the record as a whole the same directness and intensity as the individual tracks. Falling just shy of greatness, TAL is a very good record, deserving of your time (and money).
Rating: 3.5/5.0
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: 320 kb/s mp3
Label: Lifeforce Records
Websites: gotslfr.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/glareofthesun
Releases Worldwide: September 13th, 2024
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