Band:	Clouds
Album:	Durere
Style:	Atmospheric doom metal
Release date:	March 2020

01. Cold Guiding Light
02. Empty Hearts
03. Images And Memories
04. Above The Sea
05. The Sailor Waves Goodbye
06. A Father's Death
07. The End Of Hope

Durere (noun - Romanian): Pain, ache, suffering.

Durere is the fourth full-length by Clouds, the band of choice for when you wallow in sorrow and want to reach the deepest ends of the vastest sadness. They provide the space and the soundscape to make you feel absolutely at home with your melancholy. For some, this is not much more than a one-trick pony and I don't really have valid arguments to support any opposing opinion but who can say that they haven't been repeating this formula in the most sincere and convincing way?

What I love about Clouds is that they make music that is comforting by "telling" you that it's okay to be sad, it's okay to grieve, it's okay to feel devastated by tragic life events. This music doesn't rush you to get back up after you have fallen, it doesn't judge your feelings of weakness or helplessness; instead, it chooses to dance with your sorrow hand in hand. This particular album is an ode to the loss of parents, a tragic journey of grief towards closure. The songs sound as if they all share the same funereal riff, and it is the emotive acoustic guitars, the solemn piano, the lyrical flute, the lamenting violin, and the suffering growls behaving as the main companions in this journey through pain and towards redemption.

Granted, the songwriting is sort of predictable with slow acoustic parts, soothing clean vocals and mournful melodies of string instruments in the beginning of the songs that build up into a familiar death doom riff. The pairing of this riff with unearthly growls ("Cold Guiding Light"), slightly folksy and doomgaze (new term?) eruptions ("Empty Hearts"), intricate solo work ("Images And Memories") or, finally, with all of the aforementioned weaved together seamlessly ("The End Of Hope") is they key to their emotional impact. This mix of melodic doom, death doom and funeral doom is not of course unheard of, but how often does it come across as genuine as it does on Durere? If the piano on "Above The Sea" doesn't make your heart feel like it is bleeding, I am sorry but it means that you have no heart.

Clouds isn't a band to listen to every day and on any occasion. Their albums tend to push you closer and closer to the edge of the cliff and tempt you to just give up and jump into the void, but it is also their captivating beauty that somehow lets the sun come out briefly to warm your soul and protect it from the coldness of despair. When gloomy days come and you need a fitting soundtrack for those, pick Durere. It will hold your hand and stand beside you at the edge of nothingness.

"So I empty all my thoughts
Carrying images and memories
I've lost so long ago
Never to return"