ALBUM REVIEW: When A Shadow Is Forced Into The Light – Swallow The Sun

January 23, 2019 Fraser Wilson

When SWALLOW THE SUN guitarist and lead songwriter Juha Raivio lost his long-term partner, Aleah Stanbridge, to cancer in 2016, no one would have blamed him if he hung up the band for good. However, after taking time to heal, Raivio came back to SWALLOW THE SUN with two new releases for the band – the first, a dark, otherworldly EP titled Lumina Aurea (read our review here) that came on December 21st last year, and the second, a new full length. Acting as both a vessel to process and channel his grief, and as an eternal memorial to Stanbridge, When A Shadow Is Forced Into The Light is a genuine masterpiece.

A subtle tribute to Raivio‘s late partner, When A Shadow Is Forced Into The Light even takes it’s title from a lyric in Broken Mirror, one of the songs on Hour Of The Nightingale, the only album from Raivio‘s shared project with Stanbridge, TREES OF ETERNITY. This is just one of the many, many tributes included in the album. And though it is important to separate the album from the background in it’s creation to judge it on its musical merits, you cannot ignore the emotional weight behind When A Shadow Is Forced Into The Light. From the first moments of the album, all of Raivio‘s grief and heartbreak and melancholy hits with the force of a tsunami, and it’s impossible to avoid being swept away in the waves of emotion as the album progresses.

When A Shadow Is Forced Into The Light opens strong with a triple threat of mesmerising death/doom greatness – though things do lean heavily towards the doom side of the spectrum. SWALLOW THE SUN start proceedings on a high with the album’s title track, and never really let the quality dip from there. The opening song eases the listener in with a ritualistic drum pattern and a soaring, slightly Eastern-sounding melody, before giving way to the more soothing side of their style allowing vocalist Mikko Kotamäki to take centre stage. As we get to the chorus, the music maintains it’s more soothing sound while Kotamäki‘s vocals take a far more vicious, almost blackened edge.

Following from the title track, The Crimson Crown is one of the most emotionally crushing songs on When A Shadow Is Forced Into The Light, with pure, unrestrained melancholy dripping from every note. String sections and the organ-sounding keys of Jaani Peuhu take a far more pronounced role here, only further establishing the sombre atmosphere the song personifies. Video single Firelights is one of the most haunting moments in the entirety of When A Shadow Is Forced Into The Light. Despite the absolutely huge, sing-a-long-with-tears-streaming-down-your-face chorus and the utterly visceral, black metal-esque heavy break, there is something otherworldly and unsettling about Firelights. Again, the string sections and organ-ish keys are more prominent in the sound, helping to establish the atmosphere.

A remarkable strength of When A Shadow Is Forced Into The Light is it’s ability to retain the emotional weight the entire way through. Even in the heavier sections of the album that lean more towards the death metal side of their death/doom style, the emotion is there. Often coming in abruptly, as can be seen during Firelights and Clouds On Your Side, the heavier passages hit hard with Kotamäki‘s visceral harsh vocals perfectly channelling the “anger” stage of grief, before subsiding just as quickly to delve back into the melancholy. And that melancholy is ever-present, every note and every lyric is dripping with heartbreak.

SWALLOW THE SUN bring When A Shadow Is Forced Into The Light to a bittersweet close with the incredible one-two of Here On The Black Earth and Never Left. The penultimate Here On The Black Earth is mesmerising, almost straying into ambient territories for much of the song while its devastating chorus provides one of the highlight moments on the record. A crushing breakdown towards the end of the song is beautifully juxtaposed by the ever-present, subtle string section, leading into an emotional and memorable solo. If, by some miracle, you’ve made it through When A Shadow Is Forced Into The Light without being reduced to an emotional wreck, Never Left closes the record off by hammering in one final, heart-wrenching nail. One of the most touching songs on the album – which is really saying something – Never Left is heartbreaking. The strings here are simply beautiful, really standing out in a way they hadn’t for the majority of the record, while the harmonised singing of Kotamäki and Peuhu seriously hits home. This is simply a wonderful way to end what is nothing less than a wonderful album.

It would be easy to focus on the heartbreaking backdrop that surrounds the creation of When A Shadow Is Forced Into The Light, and commend the record on that basis. The strength and perseverance on display in merely creating this record is remarkable, and rightly deserves recognition. But that would be doing both SWALLOW THE SUN and Raivio a gross disservice. Regardless of the very real grief and emotion surrounding this record, When A Shadow Is Forced Into The Light is nothing less than some of the best work SWALLOW THE SUN have put to tape. This is the magnum opus of their discography, with the ability to reduce even the most hardened metal-head to tears. Crushingly heavy and soul-touchingly emotional, SWALLOW THE SUN have released inevitably one of 2019’s best albums – and we’re not even passed January yet. When A Shadow Is Forced Into The Light is a testament to the healing power of music, and a monument to the strength of love.

Death is stronger than life… But love is stronger than death.

Rating: 9/10