Melana Chasmata

This is the second album by the Swiss band Thomas Gabriel Fischer leads. Prowling Death Records and Century Media released it on 14 April 2014 in Europe and the 15th in North America. Fischer announced it on his own blog on 22 October 2013. The title is Greek and, by his account, translates roughly as black, deep depressions or valleys -- more literally, chasms as black as ink. H. R. Giger made the cover, the third time he worked with Fischer after Celtic Frost's To Mega Therion in 1985 and Triptykon's own Eparistera Daimones in 2010. It was the last album cover Giger ever made; he died a month after the record came out. The slowness and weight of the first album carry over, with a heavier gothic colour and a more deliberate placing of melody against silence. "In the Sleep of Death" is about lost love and draws on Emily Bronte. A video for "Aurorae" appeared on 7 August 2014 and one for "Tree of Suffocating Souls" on 17 November. The reception was very strong: MetalSucks and MetalUnderground.com both gave it five out of five and Exclaim! eight out of ten. The order here is the European pressing's nine tracks; the Japanese edition (VICP-65230) carries ten.