The Album That Taught Me to Sit Still in the Dark
I’ve fallen into something deep and slow and dark—and I want to stay there.
After Tales from the Thousand Lakes by Amorphis completely derailed my emotional stability in the best possible way, I dove headfirst into the next melodic death metal band on the Wacken 2023 line-up: Be’lakor.
Be’lakor is an Australian band formed in 2004. I’d love to call them “relatively new,” but the early 2000s are that weird temporal fog where everything still feels like last year. (It's been twenty. I know. Shut up.) Their name comes from a Warhammer demon, and yes, that is a red flag I choose to ignore because the music is that good.
They’ve released five studio albums so far. I started with their second—Stone’s Reach (2009)—because I was drawn to the cover art like a moth to moody grayscale. It was the first one I listened to, and it’s the one that stayed.
Eight-Minute Epics and the Art of Getting Lost
Be’lakor build songs like landscapes. Long, deliberate, and layered. Most tracks clock in around eight minutes and manage to earn every second. Across all their albums, this is their thing: instrumental passages that stretch like dusk, acoustic interludes, piano breaks, and mood shifts that never feel forced.
There are riffs, yes. There’s drumming, yes. But it’s all in service of something broader—atmosphere, fluidity, space. George Kosmas’ growls are low and grounded, more elemental than aggressive. He doesn’t dominate. He just exists—a dark current running beneath everything.
This isn’t an album made for playlists. It asks for your full attention—or none at all.
Music to Vanish Into
It’s not built for singalongs. No choruses to cling to. No standout single demanding you remember it. And yet—when you’re in it—it’s beautiful. Sweeping. Immersive.
I’ve listened to Stone’s Reach several times now, and I still couldn’t hum you a melody from memory. But in the moment? It stuns. Dreamy acoustic intros, crashing cymbals, soaring solos, piano breakdowns, tempo shifts, riffs that hit like a memory you forgot you had.
It slips away as soon as it’s over—like a dream that meant everything, but won’t be pinned down.
That’s what makes it a Keeper. It’s not trying to impress me. It’s not fighting for space on a playlist or climbing out of its genre. It’s comfortable in its shadows. And somehow, so am I.
Stone’s Reach is best listened to in one go. A glass of red wine. Darkness. No distractions. Let it pull you under.
Favourite tracks: Venator, Outlive the Hand, Countless Skies
