...DAWN

...Dawn is a demo cassette tape release from Swedish experimental/ progressive Death metal act Pan.Thy.Monium. Pan.Thy.Monium is another one of prolific Swedish metal/prog rock musician and producer Dan Swanö´s many projects. His main band in 1990 was Death metal act Edge of Sanity but he also found time for Pan.Thy.Monium. In fact 1990 was a particularly busy year for Dan Swanö as he released three demos with Edge of Sanity ( Kur-Nu-Gi-A, The Dead and The Immortal Rehearsals. Edge of Sanity´s debut demo called Euthanasia was released in 1989) as well as ...Dawn by Pan.Thy.Monium. While Edge of Sanity was a pretty straight forward Swedish death metal band in those days Pan.Thy.Monium had a more experimental approach, something that Edge of Sanity would also develop in time.

...Dawn consists of four songs in sinister and dark death metal style. As on the debut album from Pan.Thy.Monium called Dawn of Dreams (1992) all musicians are working under pseudonyms and Dan Swanö calls himself Day Disyraah. Dan plays bass and keyboards on the demo and if you know his later work with bands like Edge of Sanity, Nightingale and his solo album Moontower (1998) his style is easily recognisable. The motifs he plays on ...Dawn is just a bit darker and weirder than his usual keyboard style. Aag aka Tom Nouga (Lead guitars, organ, barytone saxophone) has not entered the band yet and his contributions which helped to make the debut album such a great experience are missed even though the music is still interesting and experimental. The vocals are really deep and brutal. Very powerful IMO.

The musicianship is good but it is obvious that ...Dawn is a demo and you should not expect vacuum tight musicianship.

The production is raw and rather primitive. You can easily make out everything that´s happening though and as far as early nineties extreme metal demo productions go this one is one of the best I´ve heard.

...Dawn has been a pleasant surprise for me. When I saw that the demo was released in 1990 I didn´t expect much from the sound quality, the musicianship or the compositions but ...Dawn proved me wrong. If you like any other of Dan Swanö´s extreme metal releases you should most definitely seek this one out as well. A bit more brutal and primitive than most of his output but very enjoyable anyway. 3 stars is well deserved. I even considered a 4 star rating for a while but that´s what I gave Dawn of Dreams and that album is superiour to ...Dawn so a 3 star rating will do.

Dawn is a demo tape released in 1990 by Pan.Thy.Monium, one of Dan Swano's early project, even preceding Edge Of Sanity's debut. Usually i don't go for this stuff at all, but because of my big appreciation for this fantastic band, i wanted to check out their early recordings as well. After listening to their 1991 EP recording which wasn't to my liking, i approached this with no expectation at all, and i must say i'm positively surprised. First of all the sound quality is very good for an unknown swedish brutal death metal demo tape, drums are well recorded and mixed, guitars are heavy and loud and the keys are noticable. Overall pretty good.

So what do we have here...4 songs, three of the songs will be rerecorded and released later, two in their debut and one in their second album. The music here shows the band's brutal death metal side definitely not straight forward but with some interesting ideas mixed together. Tom Nouga which was responsible for the soloing guitar and the saxophone in their albums hasn't joined the band just yet, so this is less experimental but still does show the band has some original ideas. The music is doomy and slow but also fast and brutal at times, the songs are short but are not stuck on a main heavy riff, there are some changes in riffs and in tempo, i wouldn't go far and call it progressive but still interesting and well played, this is one of the most exceptional demos out there.

Although this was meant for the underground swedish scene, it shows the band's potential for a different kind of songwriting, this of course turned to be one of the best and most experimental bands out there. 3 stars is adequate for this genre.

Out of the many projects that extreme metal veteran Dan Swan' has been involved with over the years, perhaps PAN.THY.MONIUM which was created mysteriously and anonymously was one of the most experimental and fascinating. The project was formed with his elder brother Dag Swan' and Edge Of Sanity member Benny Larson (drums, violin) and some other friends. They all went by pseudonyms in the beginning. Dan Swan' was only 17.

Dan started this project at the age of 17 with some friends and released this demo DAWN which was never released to the public but ultimately blossomed into a veritable side project. While just a virtually rough draft, DAWN created the basic death doom metal sound that would remain the core sound of PAN.THY.MONIUM as the band became more progressive. On this demo however, it's pretty much straight forward death doom metal which was in its infancy but even at this point Swan' was adding experimental touches most prominent in the eerie atmospheric keyboards.

For a demo this is pretty good even if a tad generic but the production and mixing is above average for a homegrown project of the era and the crushing riffs and hellfire death growls are in perfect form. The atmospheric accoutrements work quite well as they don't diminish from the brutal heaviness and instead supplement a mood setting dread. One of the few early death doom metal bands to venture into more experimental realms and what a great start right here.

Although this demo was never officially released in its own right, it is available on a physical format on the 2010 vinyl ''.Dawn + Dream II' on The Crypt label and again in 2015 on Dark Symphonies on both vinyl and CD. The band would follow up with an EP and three full length albums. One of the most interesting extreme progressive metal bands of the 90s.