Little is known about the Netherlands three piece An Autumn For Crippled Children. The prolific trio are yet to play live and members Mchl (guitars/vocals/keys), Chr (drums/keys) and Td (bass/keys) are notoriously reclusive. However, by delivering an irresistibly shimmery and poppy brand of blackgaze on As The Morning Dawns We Close Our Eyes, their latest full length, they may just about become that much more well known.
Despite the harsh black metal vocals the band employ, there is a lightness here, a pop infused edge running through the music, like in the bittersweet midsection of the bewitching ‘Of Your Light’, the gorgeous Smashing Pumpkins-esque melancholia of, er, ‘Melancholia’ and the subtle piano notes that flicker across the sorrowful tapestry of closer ‘Last Night I Believed In You’. In fact, compared to other noted blackgaze artists such as Alcest or Mol, An Autumn For Crippled Children’s darkness comes far more from their gothy undercurrent than anything else, their sound feeling more Disintegration era The Cure and early 90s grunge than anything close to the often crushing bleakness of a band like Deafheaven.
With more of the focus being on the gaze than the black, and with short concise run times, As The Morning Dawns We Close Our Eyes has the potential to appeal to those who have found the blackgaze movement somewhat daunting in the past. Simply put, this is a gorgeously addictively album, and owing to its nostalgic feel, one you can imagine coming back to again and again.
As The Morning Dawns We Close Our Eyes is out 21st May via Prosthetic Records and can be purchased here.
Words: Adam Pegg
