Band: Crown Of Autumn
Label: My Kingdom Music
Release date: 20/06/2011
_________________________________

Because he wanted to create a dark and epic form of Metal / Rock with a focus on melody and modernism, Emanuele Rastelli started Crown Of Autumn at the end of 1996. Two vocalists joined (Marco – screams, and Diego – clean vox), and with a session drummer, Crown Of Autumn recorded the Ruins demo a couple of months after the project’s birth. Then the line-up changed a little, and Emanuele started writing / working on the first full length. This one, called The Treasures Arcane, got released in 1997 through the young Milan-based label Elnor Productions. It came within a splendid edition when it comes to booklet and lay-out (great artwork for sure!). Italian label My Kingdom Music will now re-release this debut full length in a re-mastered and remixed edition, including that demo as bonus.

Crown Of Autumn recently reformed, being Emanuele and drummer Mattia Stancioiu, who took care of the drum and percussion programming on the debut as well. With the addition of (clean) vocalist Gianluigi Girardi, Crown Of Autumn did record the second full length, thirteen years after the debut.
_________________________________

Title: The Treasures Arcane – Transfigurated Edition
Review: CD (re-release)

The 1997-debut, re-released within a remixed and re-mastered version, initially registered and self-produced by Emanuele (v, g, b, k, music and lyrics), Mattia (session-d) and Diego (clean vocals) at Milan’s Malibu Studio with engineer Christian Garboni. Honestly, I did not like this album that much at all when I heard it the first time(s), very shortly after the release. And my opinion did not change that much throughout the years, because of its predictability and neo-sweet would-be we’re so angry-attitude. Now called Transfigurated Edition, haha… it’s a brave composition, evidently, with a rather original and enormously varying approach, yet at the same time, even being so diverse, too flat.
The rather varying songs dwell within melodic spheres of neo-bombastic Metal, including a tempo that differs between doomy and pretty fast. And each part is different from another. Sometimes it does sound pretty heavy, balancing towards a blackish approach, then again the excerpts are medieval-folkish, rocking, epic-acoustic, sympho-gothic, melancholic, energetic and so on. One of the many elaborated equilibria is the balance between Metal-basics and non-Metal ones (the latter including instruments like keyboards, piano and acoustic guitars). The main focus is Rock / Metal-based, yet more than once an acoustic, symphonic or ambient excerpt gets introduced. These many instrumental and structural contrasts go for the vocals as well. Half of the deal is cleanly sung (Diego), half of it comes with blackish grunts and screams (Emanuele) – besides some additional voices, like whispers, sighs, spoken words or harmony choirs.

The most sad contrast that has to do with this recording, unfortunately, is the huge difference between sublime parts (and believe me: a few times Crown Of Autumn make me horny) and pieces that bore Heaven out of me. It’s a pity, yet some parts are so pathetic that my overall impression of the total album wasn’t / isn’t that enthusiastic. And the lack of coherence was / is possible a turn-off as well (at least it is in my case).
Good ideas do not automatically and necessarily lead to great creations.

The re-release comes with the 1996-demo as bonus. Mattia wasn’t part of the band yet, so the drum patterns were recorded by a session percussionist, and Emanuele concentrated on the instruments only (except for the recording of the drums), which means that the band consisted of two vocalists back then, Marco Ibba (screams and grunts) and Diego (clean). This demo, originally called Ruins, consisted of four songs that didn’t got re-recorded cheaply on the debut (+), written with the same heroic intentions, even though not that pronounced (yet). The sound quality isn’t optimum yet acceptable, and the song quality, well, is much more impressive than the actual debut full length. Emanuele did not try to put too many ideas within one single song, and besides the whole was heavier and less modernised. As a matter of fact, the demo comes closer to the old styled gothic-oriented Black / Death / Doom-Death-scene than the Dark Metal one.

75/100 (the bonus tracks included)
(68/100 without the demo)
_________________________________

Title: Splendours From The Dark
Review: CD

After Emanuele and Mattia decided to reform Crown Of Autumn, they recruited a new melodic vocalist (Gianluigi). The first result, Splendours From The Dark, is, seen from a high view, comparable, focussing on a combination of Metal Music at the one hand, and melody, epic and artistic creativity at the other. The album lasts for forty eight minutes and as from opening song Templeisen it stands as a fist: Splendours … is undoubtedly the logical successor of Treasures … It’s an operatic-symphonic song it is, with clean and raw vocals and additional female ones (Milena Saracino), including heavy parts and acoustic ones, with the addition of harmonious excerpts and classical ones, rocking accelerations and epic choirs. It does set the tone for a totality of eleven compositions, little more up-to-date than before (read: including elements from the modern scene) and closer related to Heavy / Power Metal than any Black, Death or Doom-oriented direction.

I do still miss certain covering cohesion (although less than before), and on top of it I’m afraid the whole is less inspired; the album seems to lack of persuasion, power, creativity and will. Especially the total absence of creative and mind-blowing in(ter)ventions and surprises is disappointing. The parts that do satisfy me audibly are in strict minority to the predictable or dull ones, and after a few tries I cannot but conclude: thanks but no thanks…

60/100
_________________________________

Ivan Tibos.