Majestic Downfall Waters of Fate

“Veins” is the first track released from Majestic Downfall‘s new album, Waters Of Fate, which will be released on December 7th by Solitude Productions and Weird Truth Productions in Europe and Asia and by Chaos Records in the Americas. If you couldn’t guess based on how much praise we’ve heaped on this Mexican death/doom band over the years, this album is one we’ve been eagerly looking forward to. If possible, I’m even more eager now that I’ve opened those Veins.

To borrow the words of Thomas Paine from almost 242 years ago, which again ring true today, “These are the times that try men’s souls” (and it must be a trial by fire for the souls of women). Daily abominations abound in the news headlines each day, at least for those of us living in the U.S. Discouragement and depression vie with panic and rage as the dominant emotions. If emotional intensity could power turbines, electric utilities could be shut down as unnecessary; we’d have no need of them to keep the country’s power grids running.

“Veins” could serve as an anthem for these soul-trying times. Slow tears weep from bruised eyes in this music, and it also channels crushing pain and a level of desolation that seems unsurvivable. It howls in agony, roars in furious defiance, and glimmers with faint and forlorn hopes, mixing ethereal reverberations, bludgeoning chords, drum blows you can feel in your spine, and vocals that are riveting in their intensity. It becomes feverish and fierce, demands retribution, and reveals the magnificence of imagined triumph.

The sequence near the end in which a glorious guitar solo is followed by a head-moving bass solo, and then by one last heart-pounding surge of power before the soft, chiming notes of grief return, is especially wonderful. And there’s enough emotional intensity in the track to power a large city. Once you’ve heard it, “Veins” will stay with you.

Waters of Fate consists of 52 minutes of music. It was mastered by Tore Stjerna at Necromorbus Studio in Stockholm. The European/Asian version of the album will contain one bonus track for a total playing time of over an hour.