Short Reviews [My Dying Bride - 2020 - "Macabre Cabaret"]

There was a gap of five years for fans waiting for new material until March 2020 saw the release of ‘The Ghost Of Orion’, yet later the same year the band were back with this three-track EP of more new material, checking in at 22 minutes in length. Apart from drummer Jeff Singer, who joined in 2018, and the addition of guitarist Neil Blanchett in 2019 (who is not credited on this release), the line-up of MDM has been stable for quite some time, with singer Aaron Stainthorpe and guitarist Andrew Craighan having been there since the very beginning in 1990, while bassist Lena Abe and keyboard player/violinist Shaun Macgowan have both been there for more than 10 years as well. This continuity of tenure means everyone knows what to do to create the classic My Dying Bride sound, and while the doom may be slightly quicker than it used to be, it still has the presence and emotional feeling of a band at the very top of their game. Melancholic, thoughtful, passionate, powerful, crunching, it is all these things and so much more. Aaron has the perfect baritone for this style of music, while Andrew’s guitars have rarely sounded so on point, with a hard edge to the thunderclaps. Yet what makes this band such a dominant force is their understanding that it does not always need metal to dominate proceedings, such as adding touches of piano to take their music in a very different direction, such as on the introduction to the closing number, “A Purse of Gold and Stars”. Here the guitars take a back seat to a song about holding all our precious things close to us in a purse: it is incredibly dark, brooding, and intense. Somehow the delicate piano creates as much force as crunching guitars, even with simple chords being picked out, with just a hint of reverb – the production and overall sound is incredible. Overall, this is a wonderful piece of work and one can only hope there is yet another new album coming soon.