Sterbend - Dwelling Lifeless

Someone asked me an interesting question the other day. How is it that I could possibly enjoy most of the music I listen to? In this was implied, I'm sure, the more refined question of how I could enjoy black metal or any of its vast sub-genres. It wasn't the first time I had been posed this query. It was simply the first time I realized a true answer. An answer in the form of an album.

Artist: Sterbend

Album: Dwelling Lifeless

Release: April 13, 2006

Genre: DSBM

Rating: 86%. A despairing masterpiece

Akin to the likes of Burzum, Nyktalgia, and Silencer, Germany-based Sterbend's debut album, Dwelling Lifeless, has quickly found itself comfortably worn in my disc tray. Although pretty well your "drawing inside the lines" dsbm as far as any definition would go, the album still seems to fulfill a void that had, by and large, gone unnoticed. Nothing exceptional, just exceptionally well done.

We open the case, pop out the disc, and slip it into the player, where we are met by a cold, dim ensemble of howling wolves, breathy whispers, rain, and an oddly enchanting keyboard piece. Interesting, but not entirely a foreshadowing of what is to follow. My first listen had me more pondering their abrupt genre-shift into something more along the lines of Cradle of Filth than anything remotely dsbm. These thoughts quickly evaporated upon hearing the first note of "Depressing Paths Through Fullmoon Forests", our journeys second stop. Steady riffs and lamenting wails, all backed by the pulsating drums and inspired cymbal work of Winterheart. This, far from monotonously, carrying through for about an hour and some change to "Endtime Sermon", where it is not until the last bitter chord that we once again find warmth in our hearts. An album desiring only to project unto our own a world entirely devoid of light, as one wandering through the unforgiving landscapes of a forest shrouded in darkness. Desiring and delivering.