Band info
Band: Withered Land
Song: “My Last Autumn”
Released: November 1st, 2024
Genre: epic, symphonic black metal
Location: Belarus
Review
Though fascists unfortunately exist in every country, for reasons which are beyond the scope of this review Eastern Europe has a particularly large presence of them in black metal, as the Polish, Ukrainian and Russian scenes sadly show us. We are thus very happy to today feature Withered Land, a one-woman Belarusian black metal project organized and directed by Olga Kann!
Presenting a sort of epic, folky, synth-heavy, very melodic atmoblack which is somewhere between Rotting Christ, Ensiferum and Summoning (plus some spoken word and clean vocals which wouldn’t be out of place in a Bal-Sagoth song), “My Last Autumn” is dedicated, in Olga‘s words, to “all those for whom a moment has come in life when everything is not on time (…) when you yourself live at the wrong time and everything around you seems wrong”, and has references to The Elder Scrolls games – we see Skyrim and possibly Oblivion, but sadly Morrowind, the undisputable eternal #1 of the series (this is not up to discussion, don’t even try!), is absent.
Withered Land‘s music is very much fantasy-oriented and sprinkled with references to works such as the Tolkienverse, the aforementioned TES, and the Warcraft series, and curiously, in spite of the wintry lyrics, harsh vocals and riffage, this song has a certain “warm”, almost cozy feeling at times, similar to Lammoth, a band we reviewed here a few months ago (and loved!); this is black metal for when one feels alone and very much wants NOT to feel alone. A very promising single in more ways than one!
Lyrics
The harvest is coming
In golden chains.
Autumnal fires
Burned my veins.
Fields are dying
Turning to grey.
Predator sneaks
In search of a prey.
Darkness ahead!
Darkness!
It will never end!
Will never end!
Marvelous darkness of merciless night
With a magical veil covers my eyes.
In farewell dance of dying oak trees
I’m going to nothingness with falling leaves.
My last autumn.
My…
This last fall, I went into oblivion, the wasteland of my life. There was no other reality than a dream. Eternal winter embraced me…
Burnt to the ashes
To rise up again.
In a hall of the dead
Our memory reign.
In eternal winter
I’m standing alone.
Nothing to hope for,
All the colors are gone.
At Autumnshade Clearing
I’m leaving the path.
Diving to river
Of no turning back.
Winter is coming.
The sunset of days.
Blizzard oncoming
In frozen light rays.
My life is fading…
Blood on the leaves…
Wounds are bleeding!
The sunset of my days!
Fall of the leaves…
In my last…
Marvellous darkness of merciless night
With a magical veil covers my eyes.
In farewell dance of dying beliefs
I’m going to nothingness with falling leaves.
My last winter…
My last autumn…
My last winter…
My last…
Snowfall will cover the bones, will hide fallen leaves, both abandoned hopes and my tormented griefs…
Other links and platforms:
BC: https://witheredland.bandcamp.com/
FB: https://www.facebook.com/WitheredLand/
IG: https://www.instagram.com/withered_land/