“Grey Skies Fallen have managed to fly under the radar here at AMG, despite releasing music for nearly a quarter century. While previous albums saw the band leaning into the more aggressive side of death-doom, the return of founding guitarist Joe D’Angelo has yielded a record steeped in the weepy sadboi doom of My Dying Bride and November’s Doom.” Three shades of Grey.
As a hippie vegan with a houseplant obsession, I know all too much about blood and bone meal. If you’ve ever bought organic fertilizer, it likely contained these horrifying but nutrient-rich byproducts of slaughterhouses. While much less objectionable, Reeking Aura’s debut Blood and Bonemeal is no less vile than its namesake. Boasting band members from Grey Skies Fallen, Artificial Brain, and Buckshot Facelift, Blood and Bonemeal harks back to the halcyon days of Autopsy and Asphyx, dishing out grimy death metal riffs across the tempo spectrum.” What’s that smell?
“We here at AMG know all about the grind of productivity. “The Beatings Will Continue Until Morale Improves” is, after all, proudly emblazoned on the office wall. But sometimes, the quest for endless productivity results in work that is rushed, uninspired, and recycled. This same trap can befall musicians. While constant new material is great, and creative bursts are welcome for fans, sometimes you wish bands would hone their existing music more rather than vomiting out new material like a food-poisoned student. Which brings us to Patterns of Light, the fourth album from ex-Grey Skies Fallen keyboardist, Craig Rossi. His solo project, Drift into Black, has deviated significantly from the melo-death of Grey Skies Fallen, focusing on mournful doom and weighty themes of grief and loss.” Black and grey.
“It is somehow appropriate that I find myself listening intently to an album called Cold Dead Lands, by a band called Grey Skies Fallen, while we endure the coldest week of the year. Canada in the winter is pretty much a cold dead land, so it was fatefully wise of me to sign up for this review. There’s nothing more fitting to listen to when it is -33 Celsius outside than some long-form doom metal, especially if it comes from a veteran New York band’s fifth full-length, cunningly mixed by Dan Swanö.” Frozen and slow.
“Back in February, the Angry Lord himself graced the website with what is objectively the best article of advice to unsigned bands ever written. While that piece is special enough just by existing, what makes it even better is that, occasionally, bands even claim to have read it. When that happens, and if we don’t miss the magical moment entirely, I am always more than willing to give the band their dues and take a gander at their material, for better or worse. Such would have been the case here if it weren’t for one fact: Drift into Black is not a band, but a guy by the name of Craig Rossi.” Unsigned, unaccompanied.
“Doom fans among you will likely know about New York’s Grey Skies Fallen, a vintage doom/death act that has been steadily improving their My Dying Bride/Anathema-influenced paeans to pain since the late nineties. Grind fans among you will likely know about New York’s Buckshot Facelift, a slightly less vintage hardcore/grind band that has been vomiting up vitriolic violence since the mid naughties.” But did you know they had a shared project? You didn’t, so don’t pretend you did.
