With Colosseum Firebox seem to have returned to their heaviest roots, and that is something that I embrace with pure joy – as far doom goes hand-in-hand with such a word. Though the doom scene seems to get a bit more popular over the last few years and there have been definitely a few (very!) good releases over the last, let’s say, five years. The bombastic funeral doom scene didn’t see that many highlights, so, Colosseum’s debut album deserves a very warm welcome.
This whole project was created by Yearning figurehead Juhani Palomäki because he was frustrated about mostly everything and his urge to create very extreme, heavy and slow material. This is what the biography tells and it doesn’t sound much different from all the other stories from every other (funeral) doom musician. But for some reason Juhani managed to get something off the ground that is truly interesting, yet still very unoriginal. Musically it tends to go towards acts like Monolithe, Shape Of Despair, Until Death Overtakes Me and Pantheist. The bombastic and symphonic parts and the harsh heavy vocals are what makes this record/band the most interesting and it is therefore no wonder why the name of Shape Of Despair pops up almost every few seconds – yet, most of you wouldn’t regard this as a problem, at all. The thick layers of keyboards and melodic guitar parts makes this album very easy to listen to while never breaking down the dark feeling but it prevents the music from getting a true sinister or ‘evil’ atmosphere that a band like Worship, for instance, does have.
Anyone with an interested in the aforementioned acts should check out this band as they will be a very nice addition to your symphonic funeral doom collection. Yet, if you’re really after evil sounding pure extremity than this isn’t really the thing to choose, I suppose. But it is undeniable that this Colosseum is a very welcome band to the doom scene and to the Firebox/Firedoom roster as well!
