Chalice of Suffering- The Raven Cries One Last Time

Chalice of Suffering is a funeral death/doom band from Minneapolis, Minnesota that formed in 2015. “The Raven Cries One Last Time,” is their third full-length album. 

I’ve been waiting on this album since I reviewed their previous album, “Lost Eternally,” way back in 2019. Is it worth the wait? You bet your downtrodden ass it is! Not only that but it also surpasses the previous album in every category an album can be judged by. 

Vocalist John Suffering (An Tóramh, Forever Falling) always surrounds himself with other great musicians and this album continues that trend. Nikolay Velev (Historian, Inspell) provides guitars and keys—and is very adept at using both to generate some truly personal emotive doom here. Will Maravelas (Caustic Abyss, Plague of Stars) and Neal Pruett (Apothic, Plague of Stars) provide guitar and bass, respectively. Bagpiper Kevin Murphy (Throne of Wilderness) and drummer Aaaron Lanik (Plague of Stars, Silva) round out what is already an impressive cacophony of musicians. 

The album’s doom is packed fullf of a dense; heavy sound that's immense and dark but not overly aggressive. As such, it is a highly atmospheric album that really does a fantastic job in wrapping you up in its emotions and Gothic world building. From start to finish, the music slowly crushes you even while offering a wilted embrace. John’s vocals are a force of nature—his deep growls sound like he has swallowed gravel but are also oddly soothing. His spoken word passages add a regality to the music, a sort of macabre refinement.  

The opening song, “Another Night In Pain,” is elevated from an intro to morose poetry with his spoken word. I like how this song is over four minutes because so many intros are very short and don’t go anywhere. This one is fully fleshed out through atmospheric keyboards and a slow building of tension that sets the mood and feel of the album early on  

Sometimes simple is best, especially with funeral doom. “In The End,” starts simple with ambient sounds and notes rising above the fog. It builds up in layers, soon adding clean instrumentation as well. The drums are executed perfectly, able to generate energy while still keeping the song low and slow—as doom should be. When the growls and distortion kick in, it’s like being punched in the gut—-suprisngly immediate but the pain lasts long after the action is completed. Chalice of Suffering has always excelled as being as melodic as they are heavy—this song lets that notion shine through. The bass is a beast and my favorite parts are John’s vocals coming out in between the bass guitar notes while the guitars begin to build themselves back up to cavernous riffs. The last quarter of the song is a standout moment, atmospheric textures seeping through the clean guitar and bass before the final two minutes of the song dooms it out. 

As always, I like how the band can be gentle when needed. “All That Was Withered,” opens almost with what I might call serenity. Just when I think the song is going to get heavy, it doesn’t. I like how this song holds back when needed—-very smart songwriting and it's always a pleasure hearing a band knowing when to hold back or when to pour it on. The rain falls around the 3:55 mark with guitars falling like rain in a storm, backed by stalwart drums that guide each drop to their destination. The next clean passage is beautiful in its own way, in a way that non-doom fans could never understand. The last few minutes of the song are darkly engaging, the band combining light and dark elements that create a stark emotional resonance. 

“Fading Memories,” is a tragic song and the bag pipes offer an ardent, intense therapy that feels surprisingly warm and at home. The guitars playing off the pipes is nothing short of amazing and I just love that an instrument that isn’t often associated with doom is able to fit so well. The song hits a stride during the halfway mark, a successful marriage between arcane sensibilities and modern funeral doom. The drums are fucking impressive here too and the scream around the 3:50 mark sent shivers down my spine. The song winds down effortlessly, leaning hard into Gothic doom that reminds me of My Dying Bride. 

While the first four songs are of modest length for funeral doom, the last two, “I Don’t Want To Fight…” and “The Raven Cries…” represent the genre’s often long and unconventional song structures. Not surprisingly, I find these last two tracks to be my favorites on the album. 

“I Don’t Want To Fight,” opens with a surprisingly routing tempo with mid-paced riffs grinding my ears to death. John’s vocals ride on top of them and fall like molten lava down a hill, covering everything in their path. The bass and drums bring their own sterling performance, making this song the most intense on the album. Around the 3:33, it all begins to fade away very briefly before a second around hits again, like a wave of death. The middle passage is a bit unnerving–clean tones, sparse but focused drums, and spoken word. The song slowly crawls into one of the most sinister riffs I’ve heard all year around the 9:03 mark. I might even consider the final half to be epic, with the way the aggression comes back until the song fades out into keys.

“The Raven Cries,” is a hell of a finisher. Keeping with the ending from the prior song, this one is laced with keys that set up the Gothic doom riffs. The guitars/bass riffs in this song are among the best on the album too. They balance melody with distortion and open space for the bagpipes to give their all—-this is a massive wall of swirling sound like a typhoon put to music.  

Chalice of Suffering’s “The Raven Cries One Last Time,” is a hell of an album and the band seems to have used the time between releases to really hone in their sound. This is the work of a band who still have the fire in them to produce fantastic funeral/death doom and still keep it fresh and exciting with a firm grasp on the dark tendencies that live within the genre.  

Rating: Excellent