Band: Insomnium
Title: Across The Dark
Label: Candlelight Records
Distribution: Plastic Head Distribution
Release date: 07/09/2009
Review: CD

It isn’t a secret anymore: Finland might be (one of) the top country(s) when it comes to the mixture ‘melancholy - Metal’. Many outstanding formations hail from the cold lands of a thousand lakes.
Insomnium, formed in 1997, are, especially in their home country, a respected band, having released three highly acclaimed full lengths before on Candlelight, In The Halls Of Awaiting (2002), Since The Day It All Came Down (2004) and Above The Weeping World (2006). There was some form of evolution within the band’s musical development, growing stronger and stronger as a band, and that’s why Across The Dark will certainly be considered Insomnium’s best album to date.
I’m not sure about that, yet I need to respect what this band created on Across The Dark. All songs are slow to mid-fast in tempo, narrowing the border with the Doom-Death scene, and at the same time there is a perfect balance between heaviness and melody. Sometimes the band brings an epic form of aggression (even thrashy, listen for example to Against The Stream), sometimes the core is melancholy, then again it sounds rather progressive and introspective at the same time. The more Gothenburg-related elements the band used to inject their music with in the early years, are mainly gone, yet still a hint towards earlier Dark Tranquillity or In Flames remains. At the same time Insomnium’s hymns sort of fill the gap between Amorphis and Swallow The Sun, or better: the gap on a higher level (there are more than enough bands that try to do so but don’t succeed). And even though some pieces might seem too catchy (at least to me), the overall atmosphere comes with a modest pleasure to satisfy certain senses.

78/100

Ivan Tibos.