In order to describe Swedish duo The Moth Gatherer's sound I have added the term 'post-metal' to the above genre field. Their self-described hardcoreness, experimentalness and progressiveness is very true but A Bright Celestial Light is downright post-metal central. If you're into bands such as Altar of Plagues and Russian Circles, I'm just putting it out there that this one is most likely for you. It's thought-through, heartfelt, produced to perfection and tasteful in every way.

The opening song The Water That We All Come to Need starts off with a very minimal and repetitively haunting chord before transitioning into a loud and staggeringly aggressive mess of screams and dissonant guitar. The second song Intervention is by far my personal favorite off the album. Despite the fact that it's the longest song, it has a more traditional structure than the other numbers and builds carefully into an incredibly powerful crescendo, whereas each of the other tracks have varying levels of intensity from beginning to end. In general there's a lot of aesthetic experimentation with various electronic effects, acoustic instruments and guitar tones, but nothing too zany or in-your-face. The music has a calming nature that's easy to listen to. Even though A Bright Celestial Light is heavy at times there's nothing too extreme or cheesy that really slaps you in the face. It's all about the story that the music tells and the subtleties.

One of the first refreshing things I noticed about this band is the style of screaming. The vocalist sounds very human in his screaming which makes the emotional impact more intense. The guitar parts exist somewhere between catchy riffs and extended doom-like dronings, ultimately sounding like bleak noise moving in an orderly fashion. It's creative and unique, if slightly lacking in memorability at times. A Bright Celestial Light is not a catchy album by any means, except for a couple of random funky ribbons here and there that break up the despair a little and make the emotional heaviness all the more concentrated. Sometimes the drum machine becomes a little apparent, especially during the middle-of-the-road moments when the guitars have been subdued, but I'd assume any fan of post-metal wouldn't think too much about it.

Sometimes fewer cooks really do enrich the broth, and A Bright Celestial Light is testament to how the creative passion of just two individuals can result in an album as beautifully crafted as this one. These are multi-dimensional songs that have obviously come from a dark place of vulnerability and anger. Sit back, relax and soak in the immensely creative depression. Combined with the competency and serious work that has gone into this debut, the raw truth and emotion evoked from this release are bound to leave a mark, both on the metal scene, and of course on that piece of shit you call a heart.