SHINING "V:Halmstad" CD

At long last it has arrived at my door, after months of trying to find someone in the US who was distributing it. Upon me at last is the fifth monumnetal effort from Sweden's Shining, the "suicide squadron of Sweden." Shining is the black metal project of Niklas Kvarforth, started in 1996 to help him deal with the agonies and hurts he was struggling with in his life. Shining pretty much invented the "suicidal" black metal genre and this new recording cements their position as one of its reigning practitioners. Of course the big claim to fame was that Hellhammer of Mayhem used to drum in Shining-apparently those days are gone now, as Niklas has replaced everyone with some weird backing band called "The toolbox." Shining is only Kvarforth-everyone else is relegated to backing band status. So why do i love Shining so? They are one of the few bands who actually convey a true, frightening and real sense of depression, hurt, torment, sorrow, agony...and this has to be the result of Kvarforth's own suicide attempts (three times) and resulting hospitalizations in Swedish mental facilities. Now i know what you're thinking, and i agree-if he really wanted to kill himself, he'd just do like the girl in this fantastic album cover and eat a muzzle. So i guess there's something he's clinging to, some reason he's still here, but i don't think that his suicidal failures at all dimish the power or command over my emotions that his music has. There is no vocalist i have ever heard in all of black metal that sounds more tortured-when i listen to Kvarforth let out an out of tune wail and hear his voice break and crack, i can feel what he must be feeling. He can project and draw you into what he's feeling, the hurt that's inside. Secondly, he's an absolutely amazning guitarist and songwriter. Shining is midpaced for the most part but extremely technical-they come up with riffs and counterpoints that are rooted in the basics of black metal but they take them to a far more progressive place and create an altogether eerie and disconcerting pummel of atmosphere by way of weirdly dissonant passages and and depressing samples lifted from films along with devastating metal riffs and incredibly impressive and well planned guitar solos. A lot of time and effort goes into a Shining record and it's obvious to me that this record came at great personal expense and emotional devastation to Kvarforth. Comprised of six tracks (one is an interlude by way of Beethoven, so really only five) the record takes you down a very dark road where the sorrow and regret wells up in a massive pool, the waves getting deeper and deeper until eventually you're drowning in the total choking mass of desperation that the band has built up. The songs almost all feature haunting acoustic guitar figures and majestic and melodic solos that give instant goosebumps (and a few rock and rollisms don't hurt either.) Amazingly well recorded and totally crushing in sound, the guitars and drums will flatten you. Kvarforth's voice is getting even more torn and ragged, if that's possible-his vocals have become a choking hoarse bark that breaks consatnly and send shudders through your body-by the time you reach the final track, where a gorgeous chord progression of fuzzy guitars pulls you down down down and Kvarforth's clean (!!!) sung vocals lull you into his near suicide vigil, you will feel like there is no hope, no escape, no light, no love, nothing-nothing coming ever but an endless parade of defeats and hurt, piled higher and higher until you're buried under their collective and suffocating weight. This record is completely amazing, beautiful and fucking scary. Another masterpiece from Shining.