HEAVY MUSIC HISTORY: Venus Doom – HIM
The gateway bands that get us underway on our metal journey often end up holding a special status. Some become remnants of a musical past that we never revisit. Others, we hold on to almost apologetically, feeling the need to designate them as “guilty pleasures”. But a third category stays with us forever – those bands which chart forward much of our musical DNA, and which we keep coming back to, never quite able to get the same fix from anyone else. For a young teenager growing up in Eastern Europe, HIM were one such band. The masterful blending of gothic metal and glam-infused hard rock, combined with frontman and chief songwriter Ville Valo’s enigmatic bohemian rockstar persona – a Jon Goth Jovi, if you will – resulted in an consciously mainstream yet musically interesting pop-metal band. Having honed their signature style – the self-dubbed ‘love metal’ – over five albums, and established a stable presence on rock radio airwaves in Europe and North America, in 2007 the Finns took somewhat of a leftfield turn with their sixth full-length Venus Doom.
The heavily palm-muted riff of the opening title track gives an early indication that this might be a different experience from a typical HIM album. After trading in a few riffs that could have come from their fellow countrymen SENTENCED, they go full MY DYING BRIDE in a bulldozing breakdown which displays Valo’s ability to reach unbelievable depths with his singing voice – something rarely utilised since their debut. By contrast, his piercing heights are heard in the climax of the six-minute doom rocker Love In Cold Blood, which has Valo scream his lungs out as his lyrical protagonist surrenders to a love that is painful to be around, but not as much as it is to be apart from. Passion’s Killing Floor cements the notion that this is a collection of songs with a sense of challenge. It has a typical driving vocal-centred verse and one of the catchiest choruses they ever wrote – finally, one thinks, the obvious single! Think again – HIM subvert expectations with a desert rock bridge and a devastating funereal breakdown. Nevertheless, its appeal was broad enough to be featured on the soundtrack of Michael Bay’s 2007 box-office hit Transformers.
Although a creatively fruitful time, the recording process for Venus Doom was a tumultuous time for the band. The heavier sound and darker lyrical themes of the album mirrored Valo’s state of mind at the time, as he was dealing with the suicide of a close friend (to whom The Kiss Of Dawn is dedicated), and the dissolution of his engagement. These personal struggles, combined with the accumulated exhaustion of a never-ending tour-album-tour cycle, worsened an already difficult relationship with alcohol. The frontman suffered a nervous breakdown and was ultimately admitted to rehab very soon after recording was finished.
The undeniable high watermark of the album is Sleepwalking Past Hope – a ten-minute opus that combines classic doom metal, lush psychedelia, stoner rock and everything in between. After HIM’s eventual break-up, Sleepwalking Past Hope was deservedly voted their best song by the readers of Metal Hammer. Alongside their longest ever song is their shortest – the hauntingly beautiful acoustic ballad Song Or Suicide makes its impact in merely a single minute of music. The record reaches its apocalyptic conclusion with Cyanide Sun, a gothic elegy that is not a million miles away from the beauty of modern purveyors of sad music like PALLBEARER and HANGMAN’S CHAIR.
Originally slated for a summer 2007 release, the album was pushed back from summer to fall. Though Valo lays the blame for this on their label, it accommodated major touring opportunities – playing on the main stage at LINKIN PARK’s Projekt Revolution tour in North America, and opening for METALLICA in Europe. Upon its eventual release, the album was praised by critics for the displayed maturity and creative growth. It also sold well, reaching number 12 on the US Billboard 200 chart and breaking the top ten in many European countries. However, it failed to produce any gigantic anthems for the band. As a result, it ultimately lives in the shadow of their more hit-laden albums which gained and maintained momentum on the strength of huge singles like Join Me In Death or The Funeral Of Hearts. Despite this and the trauma associated with its recording, Valo still remembers the album fondly, calling it one of his favourites from HIM’s catalogue and a love letter to the “artists because of whom we formed the band”.
Musically, Venus Doom flexed muscles which HIM had not really signalled they have. The arrangements are fuller, the instrumentation is more deliberate, the music freely changes tempo, mood and time signature. This was HIM proving that they can write and record beyond a traditional verse-chorus-verse structure, and that as a musical unit they are much more than a vehicle for Valo’s voice and charisma. Guitarist Mikko Lyndström especially embraces the opportunity to shine by shredding out of his skin alongside his crushing heavy riffs and pretty cleans. Not all of Venus Doom works all of the time. Some of the song transitions are clunky, elsewhere sections go on for too long or fall short of their usual memorability. Throughout, the music is bursting at the seams with a feeling of inspiration.
Ultimately, Venus Doom remained a singular instance in the Finns’ career. Their 2010 follow-up Screamworks made a total U-turn, exchanging the eclectic epics with 3-minute saccharine pop-metal that is desperately impatient to get to the chorus. After 2013’s risk-free Tears On Tape, HIM eventually fizzled out of energy and called time on a career not without its missteps, but with many more high points – a catalogue of brilliant shadows and deep highlights. 15 years after its release, Venus Doom remains their absolute creative peak, and a document of a band reaching beyond itself and grasping the potential for greatness – if only just for a while.
Venus Doom was originally released on September 14th 2007 via Sire.
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