This is not the first time that I come across Tuomas Saukkonen, since in the recent past I had the opportunity to listen two of his other projects, DAWN OF SOLACE and BEFORE THE DAWN. So I was wandering, why another project from Tuomas since the other two are again his own children?

Well, as the bio of the band says, BLACK SUN AEON was born in the beginning of 2008 to reflect a darker personal side of Tuomas. As you saw in the lineup, this is am one-man-band that had some help from friends as far as singing concerns: Tomi Koivusaari (AMORPHIS) is singing in Chapter 4, Ville Sorvali (MOONSORROW) in Chapters 4 and 5 and Myni Luujjainen (SORAJUMALA) in Chapters 3, 5 and 8.

As for Darkness Walks Beside Me itself, one can easily see that we are dealing with a concept album. Like someone writing about his life in a suicide note. The idea bends great with dark doom atmosphere of the album, but unfortunately the music doesn't help in some parts. Most of the album is in mid tempo with only a few faster paces and that makes the music a little bit monotonous and not able to show the feelings of the main character. Well, that doesn't make it a crap CD, since there are some nice songs, especially the first three ones. But from Chapter 4 and on the whole thing starts to be a bit boring. The thing is that it's like something missing. And I'm talking about inspiration in order to be able to combine the music with what the character is going through and give the idea to the listener. Only at the end in Chapter 8: A Song For My Funeral is like everything is back and that the four tracks between the first three compositions and this last one were just a bad parenthesis.

As a conclusion, Darkness Walks Beside Me is not a bad album. Believe, I have listened to worst ones. But on the other hand, even though Tuomas is an inspirational man and has good ideas, I think he can do even better than giving us an 8-track CD, plus a bonus, with only half of the songs being not so insipid. Until next time...

A Song For My Weakness