My Dying Bride — The Angel and the Dark River (1995)

𝐅𝐑𝐎𝐌 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐂𝐑𝐘𝐏𝐓𝐒 - 𝐂𝐄𝐋𝐄𝐁𝐑𝐀𝐓𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐏𝐀𝐒𝐓 𝐀𝐋𝐁𝐔𝐌 𝐑𝐄𝐋𝐄𝐀𝐒𝐄𝐒 𝐢𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐇𝐈𝐒𝐓𝐎𝐑𝐘 𝐨𝐟 𝐇𝐀𝐑𝐃 𝐑𝐎𝐂𝐊 & 𝐇𝐄𝐀𝐕𝐘 𝐌𝐄𝐓𝐀𝐋…

My Dying Bride — The Angel and the Dark River (1995)

On this day (May 22) in 1995, My Dying Bride released their third full-length studio album “The Angel and the Dark River” via Peaceville Records.

Aaron Stainthorpe's lyrics continued in the vein of “Turn Loose the Swans”, focusing on religious symbolism and relationship problems. Stainthorpe has said in many interviews that "Two Winters Only" is his favourite My Dying Bride song.

Five of the album's six tracks appear on the band's VHS and DVD “For Darkest Eyes”.

Background:

For the first time in the band’s history, guitar player Andrew Craighan was the sole composer of a My Dying Bride record, which was considered “strange” to the guitarist. Many song ideas for “The Angel and the Dark River” were completed during the recording of the album at Academy Studios. Craighan cites "The Cry of Mankind" as an example: "we had the vocals, we had that guitar line [Calvin Robertshaw's repetitive arpeggio background guitar], we had the drums and the bass. The other guitar line, the heavier guitar line, was non-existent."

Musical Style & Themes:

“The Angel and the Dark River” was arguably the release that saw the band travel furthest from their death metal origins. Aaron Stainthorpe dispensed with his death grunt entirely, and Martin Powell's violin and keyboard playing now seemed to be the basis around which the rest of the arrangement was built. Apart from the final track of the original release ("Your Shameful Heaven"), the tempo was unremittingly slow.

This water-charged inspiration comes from their home, the north of England. Andrew Craighan said that they "subscribe very much to the ideas of the mist and the fog and the castles. All of that typical English stuff. Constantly fucking raining. And it's just always bleak here. It's always cold. It's always miserable. We actually kind of enjoy that in a sick way, so to write about it and to sing about it is nothing new."

Touring & Promotion:

My Dying Bride were invited by Steve Harris to be the opening band of Iron Maiden's European tour. Harris himself made the invitation, phoning Andrew Craighan to tell him that he thought “The Angel and the Dark River” was "a killer album".

About the concert, MDB guitarist Andrew Craighan revealed; “We enjoyed it a lot, but it was our first gig after six months, so we were rusty. Rehearsing in a rehearsal room is one thing, but in front of 3500 people or more, suddenly you're not sure how to play the songs in a live environment. That's the importance of playing warm-up shows. We learned valuable lessons that night, but it wasn't the ideal place for that!”

Reissues:

In 1996, Peaceville Records reissued the album in a limited double-CD edition, featuring an alternate cover scheme.

(The original CD release from 1995 and the 1996 Reissue)

The 1996 re-release contains one bonus track "The Sexuality of Bereavement" and a bonus CD titled “Live at the Dynamo”. The Live CD was recorded during their appearance at the “Dynamo Festival” in 1995.

(My Dying Bride, live at the Dynamo Festival in 1995)

Critical Reception:

In October 2011, “The Angel and the Dark River” was awarded IMPALA's gold record for sales of at least 75,000 copies throughout Europe.

In his review for AllMusic, John Serba wrote;

"Rarely does one individual sound so perfectly exemplify the mood of a record like the groaning, distant foghorn on My Dying Bride's third full-length, “Angel and the Dark River”. This English five-piece pens such bleak, soul-crushing tunes that its use of a lone foghorn to conclude agonizing opening cut "The Cry of Mankind" is strikingly appropriate (and most likely self-indulgent in the hands of a less convincing outfit). At no other time in its long and creatively prosperous career has My Dying Bride been so suicidally self-absorbed, evident by vocalist Aaron Stainthorpe's use of a clean, despairing, and melodic moan throughout, having ditched the death growl of earlier releases; in fact, the rest of the band followed suit, setting aside any death metal influences, carefully using violins and keyboards to enhance the group's brooding excursions, and managing to not sound gimmicky in the process.

Generally, the arrangements stretch out over long, progressive, and swampy plains of powerfully droning, yet still memorable, guitar riffs, patiently rumbling drums, and Stainthorpe's vague and ghastly lyrical drippings, presumably painfully squeezed out of his own slit wrists. Not unexpectedly, songs take their sweet time getting their point across, clocking in between seven and 12 minutes, standouts being "From Darkest Skies," "Black Voyage," and "Your Shameful Heaven," the latter of which actually picks up the tempo beyond a snail's slime-trail-oozing pace, but with the same destination in mind: Pure, utter, unrelenting depression.

Most likely, few will appreciate the tortured, pitch-black majesty of My Dying Bride, the band being the withered and shriveled trail's-end of fauna-wilting gothic doom metal, but MDB devotees should agree that “Angel and the Dark River” is its most effectively poisonous slab of internalized, navel-gazing horror. Other albums in the MDB catalog are more concise (Like Gods of the Sun), experimental (34.788%...Complete), and brutal (Turn Loose the Swans), but “Angel and the Dark River” stands alone in the center of a misty sea of tears, dolefully bleating its foghorn into the unforgiving wind."

Note: Any reviews shared here are for historical reference. The views and opinions expressed within are not always supported (in full or in part) by Into the Wells. — E.N. Wells