EMPIRE DROWNS – Endless Nights

vote
6.5

• Bands:
  EMPIRE DROWNS
• Duration: 00:39:50
• Available from: 10/31/2025
• Label:

• Mighty Music

Streaming not yet available

There's something rotten in Denmark, Hamlet said, but he certainly wasn't referring to the gothic metal proposed by the Empire Drowns, who instead prefer to insist on melody and epic and majestic scenarios, in any case following, almost slavishly, the styles in vogue in the genre during the Nineties: double vocal register, rhythmic and powerful guitar riffs, keyboards and a sly attitude and winking.
The group is young, but is not made up of first-class musicians: the Danes include among their ranks Anders Ro Nielsen, former keyboard player of Saturnus, Thomas Birk, guitarist of Ukraft, Michael H. Andersen, singer of Withering Surface, and the bassist of Sardinian origins Marco Angioni, also in Withering Surface as well as owner of the Death Island Studio in Denmark, where he recorded, with all the trappings, this “Endless Nights”.

We were talking, therefore, about a gothic metal with extreme vocals, which however remains far from death-doom, as it is aimed more at simple and melodic solutions, rather than complex and articulated constructions; few memorable riffs, but a rich sound that enhances the scenarios conceived by the Danes, cold but at the same time vibrant and engaging.
The singing is close to that of Nick Holmes of Paradise Lost in the lower and deeper growls, which is combined with a scream capable of recalling Anders Fridén in the latest In Flames; an influence which, added to the style of certain riffs and the technique of the guitar solos scattered throughout the album, leads the Empire Drowns on a crossover between gothic metal and Swedish melodic death in the wake of Trail Of Tears and Dawn Of Solace.
There is also room for clean singing, but it is nothing transcendental and in fact it is absolutely savored; sometimes elements also emerge that can lead back to the Moonspell of the “Night Eternal”/”Alpha Noir” period, albums not by chance produced by Tue Madsen himself, who also took care of the mixing and mastering of this second long-distance effort by the Empire Drowns.
The rhythm section is dynamic and substantial and contributes, together with the ever-present and recognizable keyboards, to creating that richness of sound which is perhaps the most distinctive feature of the Scandinavians' proposal.

Kissed by an almost Bathor-esque epicness right from the title, we highlight the fourth track “Stoneheart” among the most successful songs; other echoes of the more viking Quorthon are found on the single “Choir Of Fallen Angels”, which quotes “Twilight Of The Gods” in the main theme, but the best of the lot is “Santiago Sunrise”, very engaging and well performed.
However, there is an extreme stylistic coherence between the various pieces, which present very similar structures, rhythms and speeds: few accelerations and drastic slowdowns, essentially we travel on cadenced rhythms throughout the album.

As mentioned, the Danes' songwriting is characterized by simplicity, and this is a good thing because it facilitates the enjoyment of the pieces and helps to get to the end of the album without too much suffering; the downside is that it tends to leave very little imprint in the memory: pleasant music, which however slips away like autumn rain on studded nails.
Everything is packaged in a professional manner and this contributes to bringing the judgment beyond sufficiency, but to aspire to something more we should try to add a bit of personality or improve the songwriting, which in general is still too flat and predictable.