Solemn Golem’s music and visuals are entirely made by a Finnish singer-songwriter Pyry Urhonen. The multi-instrumentalist’s latest project CLIMBO or The Mistakes That Make Us is a fascinating if slightly unsettling and bewitching progressive rock endeavour that’s rife with experimentation, industrialist sounds, and drone overtones. I’m highlighting one of the opening pieces in this review, the dark and dreary ‘… And Try To Picture Nothing’. The haunting, terrifyingly ominous opening to this piece leaves you entirely transfixed to the continually shifting soundscape. There’s a percussive element that maintains, constantly bearing heavy onto your headset as it seeks to almost trap you in its darkness.
As the song reaches its final moments, it becomes more melodic with the electric guitar delivering an enchanting solo to swoon you into a lull. The vocals which were once menacing and sinister give way to background harmonies that serve as an additional feature in the lavish landscape of intricate instrumentalism. A wonderfully opulent and changing musical journey in a single piece, with an album that does so at will.