Band:	Harakiri For The Sky
Album:	Arson
Style:	Black metal, Post-metal
Release date:	February 16, 2018
A review by:	RaduP

01. Fire, Walk With Me
02. The Graves We've Dug
03. You Are The Scars
04. Heroin Waltz
05. Tomb Omnia
06. Stillborn
07. Voidgazer
08. Manifesto [Graveyard Lovers cover] [vinyl bonus]

Word of advice for Harakiri For The Sky: you write great music, you really do, but putting out 70-min+ long albums with 7-min+ long songs once every two years is overkill.

Let's get straight into it. This album is really long. Slightly shorter than III: Trauma was, thankfully, but still it's about as long as an album ca be before having to be a double album. The reason why Harakiri For The Sky's self-titled debut was so great was because, while it still had their trademark Insomnium-meets-Agalloch sound, it was much more concise, being about half as long as Arson is. Also every song but the bonus track is longer than 8 minutes, so can Harakiri For The Sky fill all this run time with meaningful music?

For the most part, while the full listen does get tiring, the music itself is truly engaging. Their brand of post-black is a lot more focused on riffs and melodies than ambiance, and this album has melodic riffs galore, being a lot closer to melodeath. The drums sound better than they ever sounded on any Harakiri For The Sky album, as they are handled by Krimh on this album, as opposed to JJ, who handles every other instrument. The vocals do not take any new approaches; most of the vocals are still in the same crisp scream, albeit a bit more polished.

Not much about the formula of III: Trauma and previous albums changed, but at certain points the band does try to stir things up a bit, like certain interludes or more upbeat riffs. Other than that, not broke, don't fix. Indeed, for the most part, the songs sound as good as Harakiri For The Sky has ever sounded, if not better. Coming into the album for the first time, I thought that this was definitely the best they ever sounded, and no, it wasn't only because the opening track referenced Twin Peaks. While they need to take some lessons in conciseness and pacing and not putting the most interesting song as the bonus track, the way they write said tracks isn't really up for any criticism.

Even though about 50 minutes in the album starts to drag on, I can't really point at a track and say "Filler! Out!". So how do we balance the fact that the album is too long and the fact that the music is great? Shedding some weight by scrapping one or two tracks and releasing them as bonus tracks or by cutting two minutes from every track would make the album have a bit more impact.

If all my "too long" ramblings don't put you off, take your dose here.