My Dying Bride The Angel and the Dark River (30th Anniversary Edition) Half-Speed Mastered LP (Pearl Sunrise Vinyl)

My Dying Bride has been one of the foremost and consistent leading lights in doom metal since their debut album As the Flower Withers was released on Peaceville Records back in 1992. Influenced by acts such as Celtic Frost and Candlemass, the band's heavy atmospherics have carved a huge worldwide following over the years to stand at the pinnacle of the genre and remain one of the most instantly distinguishable metal bands.

The Angel and the Dark River, My Dying Bride's third studio album, was released in 1995 and is considered to be among the highlights of the whole Doom Metal genre; the opus itself being a significant breakthrough release for the band. The album was recorded at the infamous Academy Studios (Paradise Lost, Anathema, Cradle of Filth) in Yorkshire, UK, with long-time associate, Mags. Expanding upon the strong mix of atmosphere and heavy doom riffing of previous albums, The Angel and the Dark River was full of sprawling emotional epic tracks with flowing dynamics, which also saw My Dying Bride venturing further into clean vocal territory and to great acclaim.

This special pressing of The Angel and the Dark River marks the album's 30th anniversary and is presented on limited Pearl Sunrise vinyl, including new half-speed audio master courtesy of AIR Studios.

MDB devotees should agree that Angel and the Dark River is its most effectively poisonous slab of internalized, navel-gazing horror. Other albums in the MDB catalog are more concise, experimental, and brutal, but Angel and the Dark River stands alone in the center of a misty sea of tears, dolefully bleating its foghorn into the unforgiving wind.

An 11th-hour miracle, 'The Cry of Mankind' evolved from guitarist Calvin Robertshaw finger-tapping the song's eerie opening melody (which runs forever through the 12-minute song) and building out each part as the gloomsters of My Dying Bride divined them. Even after the 'song' part of the doom-metal epic devolves into heavy atmospherics, they tried new things as singer Aaron Stainthorpe played the bottom string of a five-string violin to evoke a mournful ship's horn. The effect is both bleak and romantic, as Stainthorpe — drunk on Byron, Keats, and Shakespere — moans like a lonely vampire over his bandmates' crushing riffs.