{"id":16882,"date":"2025-10-29T19:25:27","date_gmt":"2025-10-30T00:25:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mkultramagazine.com\/?p=16882"},"modified":"2025-10-29T19:26:07","modified_gmt":"2025-10-30T00:26:07","slug":"beyond-forgiveness-unleashes-a-storm-of-emotion-and-power-on-their-newest-album-cold-as-winters-ice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mkultramagazine.com\/?p=16882","title":{"rendered":"BEYOND FORGIVENESS Unleashes a Storm of Emotion and Power on Their Newest Album COLD AS WINTER\u2019S ICE"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"alignright size-large is-resized\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"1024\" src=\"https:\/\/mkultramagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/BEYOND-FOR-1024x1024.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-16883\" style=\"width:495px;height:auto\" srcset=\"https:\/\/mkultramagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/BEYOND-FOR-1024x1024.png 1024w, https:\/\/mkultramagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/BEYOND-FOR-300x300.png 300w, https:\/\/mkultramagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/BEYOND-FOR-150x150.png 150w, https:\/\/mkultramagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/BEYOND-FOR-768x768.png 768w, https:\/\/mkultramagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/BEYOND-FOR.png 1200w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<p>The veil of frost has descended, and from the heart of the storm rises&nbsp;<strong>BEYOND FORGIVENESS<\/strong>, returning with their breathtaking newest album,&nbsp;<strong><em>Cold as Winter\u2019s Ice<\/em><\/strong>&nbsp;\u2014 a sweeping symphonic metal odyssey that melds beauty, fury, and emotion into one cinematic experience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Where light and darkness interweave, where brutal death metal and angelic classical voices coexist on the same plane, and a storyland of myth and legend transport you away into a realm of symphonic beautality, you will encounter the band&nbsp;<strong>Beyond Forgiveness.&nbsp;<\/strong>The U.S. based band emerged in 2014 as a studio project formed by death metal guitarists Greg Witwer and Richard Marcus. Collaborating with classical vocalist and orchestrator, TaliaHoit, drummer Sean Rogers, and bassist Jim Lasselle,&nbsp;<strong>Beyond Forgiveness&nbsp;<\/strong>combined contrasting musical styles into an epic adventure of symphonic metal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In 2016, the band released an EP,&nbsp;\u201cThe Ferryman\u2019s Shore\u201d. The release was embraced by the underground symphonic metal scene with rave reviews, and the band\u2019s signature sound was dubbed&nbsp;\u201cbeautality\u201d. The band followed with touring in Europe and two additional full length albums,&nbsp;\u201cThe Great Wall\u201d in 2017, and&nbsp;\u201cLive to Tell the Story\u201d in 2019, each becoming more symphonically charged. With lyrics ranging from emotional turmoil to Tolkien-eque fantasy, the music explores the paradoxes of a wide range of human experience and musical style. Incorporating extreme metal elements as well as classical composition, the band continues to push boundaries to create art as a metaphor of life. Although Jim and Richard have since left, the band had already composed and recorded an epic new album, exploring deep into the wilderness of universal human experiences, available now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<div class=\"nv-iframe-embed\"><iframe title=\"Beyond Forgiveness - Remembering (Official Music Video)\" width=\"1200\" height=\"675\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/aEXL-ArsttM?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\">Talia Hoit &#8211;&nbsp;Vocals<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\">Greg Witwer &#8211; Guitar | Vocals<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\">Sean Rogers &#8211; Drums | Percussion<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\"><strong>Beyond Forgiveness Cold As Winter\u2019s Ice Album<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\"><strong>Track by Track song description:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>1.Intro<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The orchestral intro to the album is truly meant to be a foreshadowing of the various sounds of the instrument palette used across the songs, and also contains some motifs found in other parts of the album. While the album is not completely a concept album, because each song stands alone and there is not a particular storyline, the album has several very strong threads running through it and tying it together both musically and lyrically. The intro is intended to help try to prepare the listener for the epic and intensely emotional journey through the songs and a small taste of the layers and textures of sounds that are to follow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>2.Consumed<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This song is pretty brutal in it\u2019s concept as well as one of our heaviest songs. It is about being overwhelmed by other people\u2019s deceit and lies and is written as a dramatized protagonist\/antagonist duet like you might have in an opera where the lyrics are almost a dialogue between characters. The heavy vocals play the role of the antagonist trying to completely overwhelm, control, and consume, and take everything from the protagonist, while the clean vocals are the protagonist describing the agony of being destroyed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>3.Remembering<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This song is about memories that never leave you,maybe they are repressed for a time but always resurface, and are unescapable. It is about the bittersweet entanglement of both the good memories with the regrets whci are insperable from the existence of the other, and which are both an integral part of your life story.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>4.No Reasons<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This song is about trying and failing to understand the reasons why some terrible things happen that are really just uncomprehendable. Talia can&#8217;t remember what specific situation she actually wrote this about several years ago, because so many more uncomprehendable things have happened in the world since then.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>5.When Sorrow Awakes<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This song is about the specific moment of whatever very first tragedy someone might experience in their life that shatters their youthful innocence somehow, and they are never the same person again. It uses the metaphor of the ravens bringing omens of ill fortune, and also reminds us to treasure each moment of life and to be resilient in the midst of troubles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>6.Across The Stars<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This song is about trying to come to terms with the untimely death of someone, searching the sky for an answer, and finding solace in the knowledge that someday you can meet them again on the other side. The second part of the song represents the astral journey across the stars with the heavy vocals taking the role of the departed. There is also a motif featuring the glockenspiel to represent the stars themselves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>7.Never Alone<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This song started out as a jam session in which we jokingly will say that Sean forced Richard to write something on an acoustic guitar instead of an electric guitar. We do not really write much acoustic music, but thought a ballad would be cool to include on the album. The lyrics are a love song, but with a sad twist. It is written from the perspective of being a message from the grave or just before dying, where someone is remind the loved one left behind that they are not alone as long as they carry the mormory with them, and to let the seemingly insignificant patters of nature such as the breeze, the leaves and the sun become the touch and the voice of the departed in their absence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>8.Drown In Your Promises<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This song is about the broken promises, and falling into a repetitive cycle of how you always find reasons to get your hopes up again, but then get devastated over and over again. Talia really likes to think about emotional concepts by using metaphors. This sort of th ing seemed very similar to the cycle of rains and floods and evaporation, and storms all over again, which became the foundational concept for the song&#8217;s clean vocal lyrics. Then Richard wrote the heavy vocal lyrics from the perspective and role as an antagonist in a dramatic scene, if you consider the clean focals lyrics as the role of the protagonist, so the exchange between the two vocal styles is also meant to be somewhat dialogue or characterization of the sort of conflict embodied in the song&#8217;s concept.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>9.Cold As Winter&#8217;s Ice<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The lyrics to this song started out being inspired by a really bad situation where a person did not know was making threats and causing us problems. Talia had described that person being as cold as winter&#8217;s ice. The band liked the metaphor, though, and strong emotions always spark creativity, so a song was definitely going to result from that metaphor. But the lyrics we ended up writing were not actually about that particular situation, but rather we wrote is about broken relationships.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>10.Wilderness<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This song came from pre-existing lyrics and a melody idea Talia had written before the band started writing the album and then the band composed the music for it. The rest of the songs on the album had music composed first by the band, and then the lyrics were written. At the very beginning of the writing process for the album, the band chose this song and the idea of the wilderness as a metaphor to the original inspiration to define the lyrical themes and mood and concept of the whole album. There are threads of rustic, nature concepts and metaphors running through each song and all the lyrical concepts through the album focus on deep emotions that would might be experienced while being lost in a desolate wasteland within the heart and mind. &#8220;Wilderness&#8221; was actually going to be the title track of the album until the song &#8220;Cold As Winter&#8217;s Ice&#8221; was written, at which point the band all agreed would be a much cooler title for the album than &#8220;Wilderness.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The veil of frost has descended, and from the heart of the storm rises&nbsp;BEYOND FORGIVENESS, returning with their breathtaking newest album,&nbsp;Cold as Winter\u2019s Ice&nbsp;\u2014 a sweeping symphonic metal odyssey that melds beauty, fury, and emotion into one cinematic experience. Where light and darkness interweave, where brutal death metal and angelic classical voices coexist on the&hellip;&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/mkultramagazine.com\/?p=16882\" rel=\"bookmark\">Read More &raquo;<span class=\"screen-reader-text\">BEYOND FORGIVENESS Unleashes a Storm of Emotion and Power on Their Newest Album COLD AS WINTER\u2019S ICE<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16883,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","neve_meta_sidebar":"","neve_meta_container":"","neve_meta_enable_content_width":"","neve_meta_content_width":0,"neve_meta_title_alignment":"","neve_meta_author_avatar":"","neve_post_elements_order":"","neve_meta_disable_header":"","neve_meta_disable_footer":"","neve_meta_disable_title":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_themeisle_gutenberg_block_has_review":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16882","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mkultramagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16882","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mkultramagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mkultramagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mkultramagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mkultramagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=16882"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/mkultramagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16882\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16886,"href":"https:\/\/mkultramagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16882\/revisions\/16886"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mkultramagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/16883"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mkultramagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=16882"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mkultramagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=16882"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mkultramagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=16882"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}