Sinister Shadows - Sinister Shadows

Sinister Shadows is Ryan Michalski (Idiot Robot, Ryan Cosmonaught, The Gothic Box video magazine) on Vocals, Guitars, Bass, Synths and Drum Programming. He’s aided by friend and longterm musical partner Clint Listing (aka The Slumbering) who performs the album’s ‘Intro’ and ‘Outro’.

The record is being released on Clint’s The Doorway to label under which he puts out both his own as well as adjacent works, there’s also a Youtube channel of the same name where album reviews and interviews take place. I first encountered The Slumbering via the excellent 2024 Daymares and Night Terrors split with my friends She The Throne. This and the genre(s) under which Sinister Shadows falls prove major incentives for my decision to cover this their full-length debut.

‘Intro’ the first of two tracks to feature the aforementioned Listing will surprise no-one who is familiar with the man’s output. Basically it's moody Dark Ambient but with Gothic atmospherics commonly associated with Samhain’s ‘Initium’ and Unholy Passion’. A highly effective scene setter. From there ‘Kiss The Dead Gothic Girl’ despite title wise being the kind of thing that the walking musical cliché that is Rob Zombie might come up with is thankfully far less campy and a more serious affair. Instead imagine the minimalism and sparseness of The Cure around the time of Seventeen Seconds with the at times baritone vocals of the late, great Pete Steele (Type O’ Negative), fantastic. There’s a deliciously spatial quality to ‘Day Go By’ which reminds me of the Psychedelic otherworldly flavours of Failure’s Magnified, particularly tracks such as ‘Bernie’, fans of early Swans may also get a big kick out of it.

‘Here For You’ has some unusual arrangements and at times you aren’t sure whether the CD is skipping which makes it subsequently discombobulating. However this is not necessarily a bad thing as you are instead left with a very cool Sisters of Mercy slice of melodrama. ‘Just Begun’ shares some similarities with Chrome Waves’ breed of Shoegaze inspired Post Black Metal what with the ethereal, dreamy goodness on offer, while ‘Lost My Mind’ reminds one of Depeche Mode’s Songs of Faith and Devotion when they started incorporating more Grunge and Alt-Rock elements. Remember when Paradise Lost supposedly ‘sold out’ on 1997’s One Second which saw them transition to more melodic Electronic infused Gothic Rock territory with massive hooks and rich melodies? Well that’s exactly what you get with ‘No One Home But Me’, a standout on the album for sure.

‘Waiting Here Alone’ is imbued with the hypnotic, heavy, and orchestral sounds that sees hard rock merged with Middle Eastern influences of Led Zeppelin’s ‘Kashmir’; in fact you could envisage Robert Plant singing on it. There’s also a little Killing Joke present too when they were dabbling in such sounds on 1994’s Pandemonium, brilliantly ambitious. Pete Steele once again comes to the fore with ‘Waiting Here Alone’ the Vocals feeling almost deliberate in emulating the great man. That said I couldn’t see Pete performing on this Torche meets R.E.M. bit of weirdness and despite coming across as a disaster on paper, works! Finally, ‘Outro’ by The Slumbering neatly bookends the album with yet more Lustmord-esque Dark Ambient loveliness.

A minor criticism could be that all the tracks have a tendency to blend together in a homogenous fashion and if you weren’t exercising extreme vigilance it would be hard to tell where one finished and the other began. That said, there are some undeniably excellent moments on what is a solid and promising debut. I’m definitely intrigued to see where Ryan takes the project.