CANDLEMASS – Documents Of Doom

The Masters of Doom, the architects behind last year’s most successful comeback indeed, and absolutely one of the best live bands ever – Candlemass releases their first DVD, a double package spanning the band’s carrier focused on the classic line-up including grandiose front man extraordinaire; Messiah Marcolin. And what a masterpiece it is…

All right, I already said in my last DVD review “the best DVD ever”, and I stand by that. Manowar’s “Fire And Blood” is simply better filmed, meaning the band could spend more dollars in the making, but I must say I enjoy this one even more. Objectively; Manowar wins with a horse’s neck (of steel, of course), but Documents Of Doom is the DVD that will follow me into my casket one day. So why do I like this more?

First of all, I admit it might help to be able to understand Swedish, but only to a certain extent, and I will explain why. The band has taken the effort to include comments in both German and English, not to make this a “native only” release (like German bands do all the time…)

Secondly; these guys are funny! Give Lars Johanson a stage and a microphone, and he will have people rolling out of their chairs. And the funniest thing? He doesn’t even realize it himself. But more important; he’s a class act guitar player, and along with Mats Bjorkman, solid as the Chinese wall of bricks, the clockwork from Jan Lindh as well as the unique voice from Messiah, he makes the excellent Leif Edling-penned work easily the best doom metal ever created to this day. And that’s simply a fact!

All this material is very authentic, more “real” than those big money discs out there. Still, the editing is professionally done, so no matter how simple the source is, it never gets boring.

Moving on to the content, disc one is simply the infamous gig from Fryshuset in Stockholm one hot summer day in 1990 – the same gig that resulted in the amazing live record called “Candlemass Live”. This gig showed the band at its (first) peak, but I can’t help noticing; they sound way better today. The metal scene and all the pressure to speed up back in the day seemed obvious. I am not sure if it was a result of tense musicians fearing the red recording light and therefore playing fast, or the fact that certain industry people told the band to thrash harder, but today the band plays tighter, slower and doomier. Candlemass 2002 and onwards sounds more like what the band was always meant to be; the classiest doom metal band of our time. (I must have said that a few times?) Anyhow, the show is killer, and I can certainly forgive the fact that the production pales in comparison to today’s releases. After all, it was filmed analogically back in the day, so just take it for what it is and what it was meant to be at that time.

Disc two is the real documentary; spanning from the very fist gig with Messiah, including bits and pieces from the various touring activity from 1988 to 1991, but it also sees a great deal of last year’s comeback – praised all over Europe as the greatest thing since the invention of steakhouses. You’ll be able to follow the band’s successful return to Greece and witness the massive welcome by the Greek crowd, you’ll see and hear Messiah’s famous quote at Bang Your Head, lots of offstage action and the opening from Sweden Rock, and more, ending with a heavy version of “Demon’s Gate” in Oslo. Not 100 percent chronological though, that’s mostly it.

If you know the band, you will love this set of visual ear- and eyecandy. If you don’t, you have a great opportunity to find out what all the fuzz is about, as this is a very honest presentation and insight to the masters of doom metal.

You will understand why 2002 belonged to Candlemass, just like 2003 will. DOOM SHALL RISE!