Sweden's Shining should need little introduction here to regular readers, as they are one of the biggest bands from the depressive black metal sub-genre. They have evolved past the weeping drama they once invoked. The first song is a cover of Entombed's "Chief Rebel Angel," though it feels more like Dissection. Though the more forceful nature of the vocal punch matches up with Entombed. This is the first of three covers on the album, the second being Alice Cooper's "Picking Up the Bones" from 'Brutal Planet" which is cool as you never hear bands cover the latter era Cooper. They do a good job of it.
"Joakims hogghussang" is an original. It has a creepy bass line and a darker throb, fitting in well as a follow-up to the Alice Cooper cover. Kvarforth is not growling his way through this one, nor is he singing. Musically, it falls somewhere between a solo Ozzy vibe and Danzig. It is very deliberate and works well to showcase how they are much than a black metal band, and great songwriters. Then comes their cover of Danzig's "Crawl Across Your Killing Floor". It's an odd one vocally, as there are moments where he comes pretty close to doing what Danzig does, but then he loses focus and falls closer to where he sings on their original work, but it feels pitchy in the context of this song. When his growl comes, there is some great guitar work, that balances out the section where it feels like he just did not care if he was flat or not, as in this day and age, it is something they could have fixed.
"Ugly and Cold' was previously released as a split. It is a rather straightforward black metal style, though with enough of what they do in it to work. They have hung onto Nick Barker from Cradle of Filth, whose drumming works really well on this one. Peter Huss' guitar playing shines on this one. Overall, I will give this ep a 9.5, it shows how they are on their own tier of black metal.
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