Blood: CD

If a contemporary band ever knew how to wrap the beauty of a world in ruins in gloomily shimmering and desolate music, it has to be Stockholm-based Then Comes Silence. “Every day brings us closer to downfall,” muses mastermind Alex Svenson. “For things to get better they have to get really fucked up first.”

On their fourth album, ‘Blood’, Then Comes Silence boast a remarkable energy, some kind of longing ode to the inevitable doom that somehow makes life worth living. Bearable. ‘The Dead Cry For No One’ is a rather programmatic opener - a flickering, impelling post punk mantra that suggests every dilemma must somehow end one day. Then Comes Silence unabashedly flirt with death and suffering, force a grin from the grim reaper himself in the shadows of the atomic collapse.

That there lies beauty in death has been a well-established fact even way before the Sisters Of Mercy came along. Just like those 80s goth icons, Then Comes Silence tell their morbid, eerie tales full of death and ecstasy, mourning and euphoria. “Ever since my childhood days I felt drawn to the darkness,” admits Svenson. “I live right next to a graveyard - to me, this is the ideal spot for a walk before I start writing a song.” Humid earth, fog-enshrouded graves, ravens and worms - these are the symbols riddling the Then Comes Silence songs.

Digibook CD and digital download album feature three bonus tracks. Heavyweight vinyl format includes one bonus track.