2026 seems to turn into an interesting year in rock ‘n’ metal. And it may well be the out-of-the-box section of our musical universe that will take on some weight this time. And in truth, sometimes one needs a hefty counterweight to the endless supply of beastly metal that the underground ceaselessly regurgitates.
So, why not some gothically tainted rock (and metal) that seems to reach us straight from the past? Melancholy writ large on yet another canvas of the dead and dying, with a whiff of that graveyard smell. Shadowy greetings from a sun weeping tears, but not of joy.
Gothic melancholy. A trait in rock and metal that ain’t lost on this crew. The RMR zine had its share of the genre’s many facets. From mediocre martyrs, over run-of-the-mill wares drunk on storytelling, to age-old stellar goth sloth, our roster gorges with references to this specific genre. But not many ventured all out into misery’s cold embrace like Lcous Noir‘s Shadow Sun just did. A band that was first supposed to become a one-man solo project but quickly morphed into an official three-piece. Oh, and rumor has it that session musician Claire Genoud is on axe duty here, too. A shadow bandmate or something. Or is she a full member? We’re so confused.
The band’s fare truly is die-in-the-wool goth fare in a somewhat oldish setting straight from the last millennium. You know, that stuff consisting of often synth-heavy misery and sorrow depicted in Victorian tableaux. Full of heavily made-up, breast-wiggling bodices of all flavors. Posturing in graveyards, together with downcast depictions of weeping angels and blood-soaked objects. You get the picture. And truly so, Benjamin Nominet (Sybreed) aka Ben DMN for this act, probably ain’t aware how close his vocal musings are to Blutengel’s Chris Pohl,1 intertwined with a timbre last heard somewhere in Bowie’s backyard outside his bathroom window. Not always, but often enough.
Yet, whilst this record contains a goodly portion of Darkwave woven into its fabric, Shadow Sun sits somewhat awkwardly athwart true Gothic Rock and Metal. And all this comes in a setting that favors rock with metal seemingly thrown in as an afterthought. Right from the start, Locus Noir‘s take on goth sloth speeds off at a lively pace on a neatly arranged production platform. The band’s style sails near the likes of Type O Negative and – surely – earlier iterations of Paradise Lost. But it is this darkly ominous symbiosis of guitars, synth, and the distinct keys that suddenly emerge (Cemetery Youth, for instance), together with the vocals delivered without a shred of growls, that took us by storm. Fueled by guitars that tastily keep to the background, but sport the odd solo here and there nonetheless.
Right from the start, the ebb and flow of fast-paced passages and magnanimous, almost hypnotic moments of abject sadboi fare full of grief and sorrow punches its icy claws into your warm flesh. A somewhat decadent, often syrupy flow of emotions, moods, and flavors expressed in dark red and pitch-black colors. Shadow Sun artfully merged all those elements into a darkly smelling miasma of its own making. Recalling the traditional arcane mysticism and symbolism, as well as raw sentiment stemming right from a personal background.
But at the end of the day, talent talks. Shadow Sun embodies the essence of Gothic Rock and Metal. The strongest pillar of success on this astoundingly tasty debut is the knack for aligning the songsmithing with the tale of the moment. Said differently, many goth outfits simply read the story from a lyrics sheet with the music as an afterthought. Others wallow deeply in the sump of their own misery, as if competing with Doom Metal proper were their real objective. In contrast, Locus Noir were able to grab the fainting attention span of the old geezers at the RMR Review Desk and dazzle them with outstanding melancholic fare. Sometimes a bit harsher and sometimes soft.
The outcome is one of the most astonishing Gothic Rock pieces that this crew had the pleasure of looking at so far. This band hit the olde goth vibe full on the head. And if that is anything to go by, we can’t wait to hear more from this artist going forward.
Record Rating: 7/10 | Label: Listenable Records | Web: Official Band Site
Release Date: 27 February 2026
- Yeah, I know, he’s more extreme in electronica. But you get my drift.-↩