"While I think that their most recent release "Návaz" is pretty good, this album never really impressed me. I mean it is not a bad album, and the Slavic folk influences that make Silent Stream of Godless Elegy interesting are present here, too.
In addition to the Slavic influences, the band seems to have taken inspiration from early Paradise Lost and My Dying Bride, which is of course not a bad thing at all, and a lot of the riffage seems reminiscent of My Dying Bride's more melodic efforts.
The music itself is not bad - but not as good as on "Návaz", and one reason is of course that they are much more experienced musicians now in 2011 than they were back in 1998.
The main reason why I, while I like this album, is not the biggest fan of it is the vocals.
Back in the 1990s, death doom (doom metal with growled vocals) all the rage, and Silent Stream of Godless Elegy took the growled vocals from death doom and applied them to their own brand of melodic folk doom metal... and that just does not work, I think. I have always found it problematic with growled vocals and doom metal, because I never really thought that such a brutal singing style suited the melancholic style that i doom metal - especially not doom metal that emphasizes melody to the extent that Silent Stream of Godless Elegy do. To be honest, I think that the growled and harsh vocals on this album sound out of place and outright stupid.
This would have been much better as an instrumental release (the music itself is multifaceted enough for this to be possible), but that is water under the bridge now, because, as we know, they ended up hiring a female vocalist.
(review originally posted on metalmusicarchives.com)"
""Návaz" is in many ways an interesting album. First off, the base style is the more doomy kind of gothic metal (derived from the works of My Dying Bride and Paradise Lost), and I tend to prefer that to the more poppy type of gothic metal that is associated with a lot of Finnish acts. Secondly, it has folk elements; now, folk elements are perhaps nothing new, given that folk metal has become pretty much an established genre, but most folk metal seems to draw on either Celtic or Nordic folk music. Therefore, Silent Stream of Godless Elegy's "Návaz" with its Slavic influences is a fresh, yet melancholic, breath of air. Thirdly, the lyrics are sung in the band's native language rather than in English, and, I must say, Czech is a very soft and pleasant language to listen to when sung.
While there are a lot of such interesting elements that certainly make "Návaz" more than worthwhile, the album has yet to captivate me. As it is now, I think that the music certainly is quality music, but I think I need to give it a lot more spins for it to really be able to give it the appreciation it deserves.
Recommended to fans of doom metal and gothic metal. If you like you violin-ladden doom metal, you are bound to like "Návaz".
(review originally posted on metalmusicarchives.com)"
