{"id":495432,"date":"2025-10-13T06:12:14","date_gmt":"2025-10-13T06:12:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/495432\/"},"modified":"2025-10-13T06:12:14","modified_gmt":"2025-10-13T06:12:14","slug":"morke-to-carry-on-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/495432\/","title":{"rendered":"Morke – To Carry On Review"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"One of my favorite bits in the game Portal 2 comes near the very beginning<\/a>, when the player is commanded to go stand in front of a piece of art. It\u2019s an okay piece, depicting a lovely mountain overlooking a lakeside cabin where everything looks peaceful, somewhat colorful, and safe. By the end of our momentary study, we are assured we should now feel \u201cmentally invigorated.\u201d Such mental vim and vigor is sought out in more artistic albums, which don\u2019t seek to liquify teeth as much as transport us to other realms and times, whether it be brimming with life and motion or a well-executed snapshot of a mood. Morke, <\/strong>a project spearheaded by sole member Eric Wing, have arrived with self-described \u201cAtmospheric Castle Metal\u201d on display for their fourth album To Carry On, and the question is, will you indeed keep it moving after indulging in its color schemes, or allow yourself to get swept away to times long forgotten? <\/p>\n

On first listen, all I could think was \u201cwow, this sounds exactly like Obsequiae<\/strong>.\u201d Turns out my ears are very astute, as Tanner Anderson is credited in the promo as making contributions to the album. The precise degree of his participation isn\u2019t specified, but if you\u2019re a sucker for his band, then there\u2019s plenty for you to feast your ears on here. To Carry On tries its hand at singing its own Palms of Sorrowed Kings while taking a much more streamlined and basic approach. Trimming down the more raw production of previous efforts, Morke<\/strong> spread out the tonal palette to allow leads, leads, and more leads (\u201cFalling Leaves\u201d, \u201cSublymed Respair\u201d) to carry the bulk of the presentation, with enough clarity in the production for some tasty bass lines (\u201cAshes of Fuedalism\u201d) to make their presence known. <\/p>\n

\ufeffTo Carry On by Morke<\/a><\/p>\n

Much like individual brush strokes coalesce into one whole, To Carry On places pretty much all its emphasis on atmosphere. The bulk of the album is mid-paced, with leads relaxing and guitar tones colorful. The drums are well placed as far as occasional double bass drops go to remind you that this is, in fact, still a metal album, even as the tempo and general vibe never approach anything truly heavy. The uniformity of the tonal palate is the larger philosophical struggle Morke<\/strong> presents: this painting of a flowers-and-fog-drenched castle is well crafted, but there are precious few touches that truly stand out. Mid-album tracks \u201cCoup D\u2019oeil\u201d and \u201cViola Odorata\u201d flow nicely together with some riffs of genuine memorability. However, bookending the album come tracks which end up starting to sound self-plagiarizing, with similar intervals and scales utilized, which never become boring, unto themselves, but do become familiar far too quickly. <\/p>\n

\"\"Ultimately, the question of listener enjoyment will come down to expectations. To Carry On doesn\u2019t have the vibrancy and depth of Summoning<\/strong> or the kinetic enthusiasm of Obsequiae<\/strong>. Those bands are atmospheric masters who manage to invoke life into their riffs, the latter with their energy and the former with their creative use of other instruments. What Morke<\/strong> offers up instead is a collection of tracks which play toward the greater whole, where the listener is enveloped in an atmospheric sense without necessarily latching on to any particular highs, lows, or fist-pumping \u201chell yeah\u201d inducing moments one typically looks for. In fact, other than the aforementioned two-track run in the middle, To Carry On is relatively devoid of highs and lows, instead leaning in on complete and tonal consistency, for better and worse. <\/p>\n

This makes administering an appropriate score more challenging than I\u2019d expected. I have been fortunate enough to visit my share of art museums over the years, and no great painting can be appreciated at a mere glance. Color schemes, stroke methods, and materials used all warrant consideration when enjoying the greater whole of the painting before us. And yet, part of me insists that I don\u2019t listen to albums for the same reason I look at paintings, and I feel that holds To Carry On back. If you are looking to get mentally swept up into the moods of knights and serfdom, mentally add an extra half point for yourself and hear an enthusiastic endorsement on the potency and excellence that the atmosphere summoned has to offer. For my own part, I can\u2019t help but hope for more vibrancy and less \u201cstill life\u201d going forward. Until then, you will hear a buzzer. When you hear the buzzer, you may stare at the art\u2026<\/p>\n

Score:<\/strong> 2.5\/5.0
DR<\/strong>: 7 | Format Reviewed:<\/strong> 320 kbps mp3
Label<\/strong>: True Cult Records <\/a>|
Website<\/strong>: Album Bandcamp<\/a>
Releases Worldwide<\/strong>: October 10th, 2025<\/p>\n

\n\tGive in to Your Anger:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"One of my favorite bits in the game Portal 2 comes near the very beginning, when the player…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":495433,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3936],"tags":[20843,743,12295,63531,77,163065,269,123309,156239,6080,6082,11468,163066,123311,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-495432","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-2-5","9":"tag-743","10":"tag-american-metal","11":"tag-atmospheric-black-metal","12":"tag-entertainment","13":"tag-morke","14":"tag-music","15":"tag-obsequiae","16":"tag-oct25","17":"tag-review","18":"tag-reviews","19":"tag-summoning","20":"tag-to-carry-on","21":"tag-true-cult-records","22":"tag-uk","23":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115365383182238810","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/495432","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=495432"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/495432\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/495433"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=495432"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=495432"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=495432"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}