Imber Luminis - Same Old Silences
Updated: 4 days ago
A Little Controlled Bloodletting for the Soul
Let’s talk about re-recordings. Remixes. Remasters.
Not technically. God no. I don’t care.
Emotionally. Because I’ve learned that quite a few people have surprisingly strong opinions about this stuff.
Some say songs are meant to be left alone. Thrown into the world in all their primal glory and then preserved exactly as they were. Untouched. Unmutilated. The original essence must remain sacred. And honestly? I get it. If you love something deeply enough, the idea of someone taking it apart and rebuilding it into something you might not love anymore can feel almost offensive.
And then of course there are those “just write something new” people. Why re-record something that already exists? Where’s the art in doing it again? Give us new material, you lazy bastards. And I want to say that’s a horrible take and never true. Then I look at certain bands in the more mainstream end of the pool and think… yeah, alright. Fair. It is a money grab.
I guess this is one of those things you have to judge case by case. Which is convenient, because of COURSE I had a very specific case in mind before I started this whole philosophical descent into re-somethings.
So let’s stop pretending this is about Doro’s latest LIVE reissue and get to the actual point. Because today I want to talk about Sufferings. And Silences. About two pieces of music that kept being revisited, altered, extended and twisted over the years until they finally arrived at what feels like their definitive form.
The Long, Complicated Life of Two Songs
I am talking about Imber Luminis’ 2019 album Same Old Silences. An album that has been a staple in my listening pile for quite some time. Why have I never talked to you about it? Well. Didn’t know how, did I? There’s always this kind of music that feels just a bit too close to the heart to talk about. That almost feels ridiculously personal. That almost makes you feel a little ashamed of how closely you’re holding it. Same Old Silences is one of those.
That scream. Right at the beginning.
I knew it was coming before I heard it for the first time. The little synth build-up is subtle, but there was only ever one possible resolution. And when it comes, I swear to you—there will never be a point in my life where it does not make me smile. Somewhat pained, but it’s a smile.
Because this sound—this, right here—cracks something open and lets everything bleed out. Listening to Same Old Sufferings has become somewhat of a medical treatment for me. Controlled bloodletting, if you will. And as I keep returning to it again and again, I figured it was time to walk you through this little offering.
Now. What’s all this got to do with re-somethings, I hear you ask.
Quite a lot, actually, because the two tracks on Same Old Silences had already taken on several forms before they arrived on this particular release in this particular shape.
Same Old Sufferings first appeared on a compilation in 2011, and back then it was just one part. A bit more than seven minutes. Contained. Done for. A nice little lullaby of pain. And then it evolved. Later that same year, it came out as its own single. Part I got an instrumental counterpart and a companion in Part II. And then Part II got a remix as well. Of course it did.
And because he still wasn’t finished, 2013 saw the arrival of an orchestral version of Same Old Sufferings. That’s a lot of versions of one song, you might think. But he still wasn’t done. Because in 2019, the whole thing was finally completed with Part III. And now Same Old Sufferings had three parts: Revulsed – Highway – Nothing Can Go Wrong. And it didn’t just get another part to bring it closer to completion. No. The whole thing got re-recorded as well.
Bit much?
But wait. There's more.
There is another track on Same Old Silences: Silence III.
Three?
Quite.
And because you’re intelligent people, I trust you’ve already deduced that I and II do, in fact, exist. This is getting rather administrative now. Silence first appeared as an instrumental in 2011. Silence II followed on Imber Aeternus in 2013. And in 2019, Silence III completed the set, this time with guest vocals from Dryáda.
There.
That’s the family tree.
Please don’t make me draw it.
Anyway. Don’t get your head tangled up in the dates. You don’t have to remember a single thing I just told you.
The only thing that matters here is this: there were two songs. And both of them kept being revisited. Again and again. They got extended. Continued. Expanded. Reinterpreted.
Why?
I don’t know.
But I do have thoughts. Obviously. Which means it’s probably time I stopped waffling about release dates and got to the actual music.
Let's go.
Same Old Sufferings, Same Old Loop
When I found Same Old Sufferings, all three parts already existed. So I never knew Part I on its own before being introduced to II and finally III. I heard the whole thing as one track. For me, those parts always belonged together, and I never really looked at them separately. It was never three songs or three stories. It was one story. Looping.
About the highest highs and the lowest lows. About looking for a way out and never finding it. About peace that never comes. About giving up, only to get up again. About living a life that never feels quite right. About belonging and still never feeling part of anything. About keeping yourself breathing while thinking about ending everything every single day. It’s about finding something that almost resembles peace, only for everything to fall apart again and start from scratch. It’s a never-ending battle. It’s the same old sufferings, repeated over and over and over and over…
So yes. Revisiting this track? Giving it different forms? Adding to it as the loop keeps repeating?
It feels like the most natural thing in the world to me.
The mood changes across the three parts, and the music shifts along with it.
Part I starts with this tinkling synth melody. It’s soft. Melodic. And then comes the scream I’ve already talked about. And with it, the growls. The melody that felt so gentle in the beginning gets picked up by the guitars and suddenly launches into the most bittersweet form of longing.
One of the most noticeable changes from the original 2011 version: the way the vocals are layered. Here we get the best of both worlds. The DSBM wails. The raw pain. And the softer growls, like that beast in the background that never really leaves.
It depends on the day which one I follow, but most of the time it’s the growls. Which means this whole thing actually feels quite soft to me. Comforting, even. The lyrics are probably the most manic of the three parts, but the music counterbalances them. That ever-looping melody gives the whole thing something hypnotic, and before you know it, you’ve closed your eyes and just given yourself over to it.
Part II is all softness. Clean vocals. Tender piano. Synths somewhere in the background. And again, there’s that contrast between the music and the lyrics, because the lyrics are anything but soft.
This is the crash after the high.
The piano keeps building, the vocals get more urgent, and one of my favourite moments in the whole track is the point where he finally lets go. When the softness gives way to that first scream in this part, and it is just so full of pain.
Gimme the gun so I could stay.
From there on, the clean vocals are accompanied by the wails. Layering again. Doing the trick. The whole thing suddenly feels much more dynamic. It’s moving now. No more soft drifting. It becomes forceful while still staying fiercely rooted in the “this is fucking beautiful” category.
Part III is probably the bleakest of the three, and it hurts me every time I listen to it. It’s what comes after the high. After the low. When there’s simply nothing left to feel.
If Part II was soft, this one starts even softer. Just piano and clean vocals again. Very intimate. Very stripped. It’s also the most brutal of the three, even if the music doesn’t sound that way at first.
But he gets there.
And eventually, we’re back to the growls. The kind I’ve come to love so much. You know the ones. This is the funeral-doom side that was added to the whole series. The vocals I’ve come to love from SLOW, where every syllable takes its sweet time and he sounds like the earth itself sighing. That shit. You know exactly what I mean. I’ve written enough embarrassing paragraphs about those growls that we’re dangerously close to needing a dedicated tag on the blog. Moving on.
And when he’s done with that, we get the screams.
The most perfect screams.
I’m not kidding. They are so honest, so raw, that every time I hear them—even when the album is technically just running in the background while I’m doing something painfully ordinary, like unloading the dishwasher or wiping down the kitchen counter—I have to stop.
Just for a second.
Because suddenly I’m not thinking about plates or crumbs or whatever deeply glamorous task adulthood has assigned me that day.
I’m listening.
Because they go straight into my heart.
Not many people can translate emotion this directly. This honestly. This painfully human.
It’s probably his secret power.
The Encore I Keep Pretending I Don’t Want
The funny thing is, every time I finish Same Old Sufferings, I’m actually quite reluctant to keep listening. The whole journey feels weirdly complete. Done. I’ve been through the high, the crash, the aftermath. Feels like a reasonable place to call it.
But there is still Silence III.
And every fucking time, I’m like: nah. Don’t think so. I’ll just start Same Old Sufferings again.
Except by then, Silence III has already started. So I let it.
Slightly reluctantly at first. Still mentally looking over my shoulder at the track I'd rather be restarting.
And every single time, Silence III wins.
Because the bastard is just too fucking good.
It starts with a bit of atmospheric guitar picking, then some distortion, some keys, lulling you into a false sense of softness for a moment.
Well. “Moment.”
About two minutes.
It holds you there just long enough to make the shift count. Because the second the vocals come in, I just lose my fucking mind.
This track has some of the most wholesome screaming you could possibly wish for. And when Dryáda joins in, we don’t just get a second set of vocals—the whole song starts moving.
That’s the bit I love so much about this kind of music. The dance of the damned bit. The point where the tension finally has somewhere to go. When your shoulders loosen. When your body starts following the rhythm without asking permission. When you sway and grin like an idiot while two voices tear through all that desperation and ugliness.
And somehow, instead of dragging you down, it shakes something loose.
That’s the release.
Laughing straight into the face of it all and moving anyway.
Because why the fuck not.
Listening to those two screaming their lungs out is bliss. It’s so good. And God, I wish I could scream like that. I really do. I wish I could conjure that kind of relief out of my own body instead of outsourcing it to other people through headphones like a perfectly functional adult.
The keys come back. The drumming picks up. The guitars join in. Everything gathers into this whirlwind of sound, spinning and spinning and spinning until we slip back into the uglier screams, and then the growls return to drag the whole thing towards its end.
And finally, there is just piano.
Beautiful.
Sad.
So fucking sad.
It leaves you quite empty.
And well…
In silence.
Silence Is Not Peace
I don’t do silence well. I’ve never done silence well.
It eats me alive. It gets loud in my head in a way actual noise never does. So having a track like this to keep me company when my own silence starts roaring? Priceless.
It’s the screaming that drowns everything else out. The wailing. The growls. The noise. All of it giving the things in my head somewhere else to go for a while.
And I think that is why I keep coming back to this album again and again and again.
Which brings me back to where I started.
These songs were revisited over years. Extended. Re-recorded. Reworked. Given new parts. New voices. New shapes. Apparently they weren’t finished just because they had already been released once.
Some things don’t leave you alone after you’ve said them once. Some feelings come back. Some sufferings are, unfortunately, the same old sufferings.
So you return to them. You look at them again.
You change the shape. You add something. You scream differently this time.
And many years after Same Old Silences was released, I keep returning to it too.
It’s another companion I’ve found. And I am so incredibly thankful for it.Thank you for creating music like this. For giving me an outlet for all that stuff I couldn’t cope with otherwise.I will never stop loving this.