Melancholic, sad, winter depressed doom metal from Russia; too bad this band has just split, because Autumn had the right idea and some nice talented musicians. This is the re-release of their 2000 second full length album; Stygian Crypt decided to re-release this material and they actually pulled it off quite nicely, adding a new and more artistic look to the cover of the album, something that definitely helps a doom band a lot.

The melodies and the “instrumental” times are greater than the moments in which Yury “Rottor” Ketov is singing and sometimes ruining the entire song; its not that his vocals are that bad, is just that sometimes they sound forced, like he is pretending to have this deep interesting voice, but you can tell he doesn’t; well he is not that bad because in the song The Conqueror Of My Heart he manages to pull through in a great way, even earning him some comparisons with amazing singer Fernando Ribeiro; so maybe is just me that finds Rottor annoying at times.

The album is a 35 minute long journey through all those romantic, and gloomy atmospheres created by this Russians in every guitar riff and backed up nicely by some percussion work involving a faded back drum that sounds great in that tone. A couple of songs worth mentioning are as follows:

Well for an intro Aurora Postera sure is long 4 minutes; the melody is sad and gloomy and the guitar keeps a very accurate tempo with nice riffs and some percussion been added to some crucial moments, giving this song a particular strength and value that other bands just can’t seem to get, an intro song should create expectation, not boredom.

Radi Etih Glaz introduces the male vocals of Autumn, Yury “Rottor” Ketov, also Autumn’s guitar player and founding father; Ketov sounds like a singer with great talent but not much work on the development of the levels he must achieve and the correct moments to do so, other than that he reminds me of Fernando Ribeiro from Moonspell; you can say the guitars take the lead in pretty much all the song, the volume of them as well as the sad and cold riffs deliver a great atmosphere of depression and beauty, a mix like only doom metal can deliver; the drums and bass do an amazing job, they don’t just blast off in the background, they actually keep the obscure feelings alive through out all the album.

The Conqueror Of My Heart, this is the song that sounds like Moopspell, the female vocals are introduce and they are beautiful thanks to Marina Kogan; she brings beauty and melancholy to the song while Rottor takes care of the desperation cutting through those sensible feelings in order to create a very interesting changing song with diverse riffs that go from sharp to romantic.

Black wings is a good album if you are looking for something beautiful to help you drown yourself in self pity.