Liste der Bands Doom Metal 40 Watt Sun The Inside Room

I wasn't expecting much from this to be honest, I absolutely hated Watching From A Distance, I found it boring, flat, uninspired and way too overrated for its own good. Therefore it comes as a surprise that Warning's spin off project 40 Watt Sun is marginally better. It still sucks mind you, but compared to Warning this shits golden. Gone are the horrendously whining vocals and replaced with what seems like a much better and honest performance by Patrick Walker. The generic melodic doom stuff has been replaced by droning, shoegaze inspired melodies a la Jesu. It adds much more to the atmosphere than Warning ever could have accomplished. It still suffers in a lot of major aspects but at least Patrick and co have stepped up their game.

The problems with 40 Watt Sun seem to have been carried on from the days of Warning. The sound is still very much similar, boring, bland and repetitive with annoying vocals but The Inside Room feels a lot more refined and realized than Watching From A Distance. The vocals aren't as whining which is definitely a good thing, they have more power behind them, lest teenage angst. They still sound fucking weird mind you but at least they're an improvement over his previous work. The atmosphere is more powerful, more crushing. Guitars have been muddied up a lot, distortion has increased, giving the guitars a thick and crunchy tone. It adds a lot more to the atmosphere and I won't deny it creates a decent wall of sound effect. They're suitably hypnotic, drawing a lot of influence from the drone and shoegaze genres respectively. They're still highly repetitive, but the droning nature of the compositions works in their favor. The tempo department is much more challenging giving the music a claustrophobic and oppressive feel. Whilst Warning would do all they can to ensure that they kept at the same lifeless pace for the entire album, 40 Watt Sun take a much more determined effort in mixing things up a bit. It's a lot slower paced allowing for the music to be heavier. Guitars drone on with malicious intent, creating a decent wall of sound. It's not as riff oriented as Warning, allowing much more for textured riffs to shine through. Whilst the riffs themselves are generic and boring, I greatly appreciate the change in style from Warning allowing for a much better sound to come through.

Whilst I don't particularly like The Inside Room it's a whole lot better than Watching From A Distance. The sudden influx of drone and shoegaze sure helps. Whilst it does sound underdeveloped and carries with it a tendency to become extremely monotonous, the glimpses of potential are here. The song structures aren't too bad, there's at least acoustic breaks used for once, adding a bit more to the atmosphere and ensuring that the music doesn't become too monotonous. Vocals still need improving but at least Patrick sounds less whiny, carrying his voice with a greater sense of power and authority. The numerous improvements from Warning still aren't enough for me to consider this a good album however. It feels underdeveloped, songs tend to drag on way longer than they should. Atmosphere can become lost in the sea of highly repetitious song writing. Guitars don't do anything exciting, whilst the drone influence works great they need to become more adept at creating good atmospheres from oppressive drones. Drone in itself is a difficult aspect to get right within the music world and an artist needs to ensure than enough has been given to it to allow it to thrive. 40 Watt Sun have all the intention to be good at writing drones, but they just don't have the talent. There's some pretty good, ethereal shimmering leads here and then but for the most part the guitars are fairly inactive, devoid of anything significant. The wall of sound effect like I mentioned earlier is pretty cool, bringing to mind Jesu, but it doesn't even come close to the sonic power that Jesu has. 40 Watt Sun feel lifeless, diluted. There's not enough ideas on The Inside Room, it feels apathetic and lethargic. Whilst there are all the makings for something actually good buried within here it's mixed in with an ocean of boring ideas that don't go anywhere.