Labels: self released
Review by: Alex Deller
While the dodgy cover art and questionable typeface would ordinarily be enough to put me off, I came to this one knowing that Morgion and Watchmaker folks were involved … two bands whose calibre meant some of my concerns could at least be allayed. Onera definitely owe more to the former than the latter, playing a lugubrious brand of doom that’s rooted in the genre’s distant past: epic in the Lord Of The Rings sense of the word and emotional in a way that borders on romantic without quite wearing a frilly shirt about it. Mournful, undistorted playing nuzzles up against vast swaying riffs and the vocals remain cleanly sung even while all else around them is storm and chaos. Candlemass serve as a touchstone, but perhaps more relevant would be that point in the 90s when the Peaceville Three scraped the black paint from their bedsit windows and opted for velvet drapes instead. The results – particularly the last few climactic minutes of ‘Still As Stone’ – are enjoyable if not truly essential, and while there are tweaks that could definitely be made this is a solid enough start from folks who definitely know what they’re doing.