Funeral Leech - The Illusion of TimeFour years on from their debut, ‘Death Meditation’, funeral doom outfit Funeral Leech are back with their second, with five songs coming in at just over 43 minutes in length. They have managed to keep the same line-up, so it is still Kevin Kalb (bass), Lucas Anderson (drums, vocals), Zack Chumley (guitars) and Alex Baldwin (guitars), while there are also some additional vocals by Ivan Caban on “Penance” and Dino Sommese on “The Tower”. The vocals are incredibly deep, moving strongly into death metal territory, while their control of doom is quite superb. They understand the needs for nuances and changes, so we get different sounds (the tolling of a bell is nicely effective), tempo changes, and the solos sit nicely over the top.

In some ways this is a crossover album in that they are taking a genre and influences from the likes of Mournful Congregation, Evoken, Asunder, Solstice, Candlemass, Cathedral, Scald, and turning them into something quite different without ever losing the passion and fire of those bands. They are signed to a label who are far more well known for death metal acts, but these guys fit in well with the rest of the genre as they incorporate the doom within it, creating something which is both unusual and mainstream all at the same time. There is a lot of depth, and bass, on this album and for those who enjoy their music to be dark and uncompromising there is a lot here to enjoy. 7/10 Kev Rowland