This latest release from Virgin Black has moved past to making music to composing music. The album shows off the composing skills of Rowan and Samantha, which was complimented by the impressive playing of the symphony that was backing them.

The album mixes the beauty of classic, the heaviness of metal, and the feeling of gothic doom perfectly. It draws you in and embraces you, taking you on an aural journey. It is not an album trying to incorporate strings for the sake of gimmick. It is, however, an album full of the sweeping sounds that only a symphony could bring. It is both a masterpiece of the classical genre and the metal genre.

I anxiously await the release of the two complimentary pieces to this release. One will strip away the metal, and give us the pure beauty of the symphony. The other will strip away the classic, and leave us with the surging intensity of the metal.