Agalloch's second album, The Mantle, is a leaps-and-bounds improvement over their first full-length, 1999's Pale Folklore. That wasn't a bad album, but it was hampered by a low-budget production job that didn't suit the sophisticated tone of the music. The improved production is the first thing that stands out here, evident in the more detailed arrangements, the classier guitar tones, and the fuller overall sound. That said, the music itself has also evolved and matured. Along with the {$Katatonia...   [ read more ]

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Despite their style being firmly grounded in the dark metal genre, Agalloch has always been a band who prefers experimentation over settling on a niche. The result has been two full-lengths and a handful of EPs that have bridged the gap between gothic doom, black metal, neo-folk, post rock, and industrial/ambient soundscapes. The band has earned a rabid cult following over the years due in part to their artistic & independent attitude, elusive aura, and scarce but volatile live performances. Four years aft...   [ read more ]

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Not only was Agalloch's Pale Folklore an astoundingly ambitious and accomplished debut, it made for a stark geographical anomaly, since its eclectic, avant-garde folk-metal was the sort of thing one would expect to emerge from Scandinavia -- not Portland, OR. Epic, atmospheric, deeply melancholy, yet extremely heavy, its songs showed the same level of daring cross-pollination as those of Norway's Ulver or Sweden's Opeth, as well as off-the-beaten-path experiments with folk music for...   [ read more ]

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