If I had to describe this record in just a sentence, it would be "generally disappointing, but with a few high points". Thirty-three years into their career, Sweden's Katatonia play it safe with their new release City Burials, a weak follow up to their solid 2016 release The Fall of Hearts, and a continuation of the new, distilled sonority of the band.
(Originally written on Nov. 13th 2020 for RYM, updated on Sep. 12th 2026)
Four years after the release of The Fall of Hearts, Katatonia has put out their new full-length effort: City Burials. My expectations were high: I generally enjoyed the band's past few releases, from the almost cheerful sounding Dead End Kings; passing through Dethroned & Uncrowned, an unplugged version of that same record; and finally the masterful, proggier-than-ever The Fall of Hearts, which managed to balance the familiar Katatonia's somber and atmospheric mood with the new, more polished rock sound.
I ended up disappointed. Even though the band took roughly four years between releases, the new material does not feel innovative in any way. Rather than exploring deeper into the lush soundscapes of The Fall of Hearts, Katatonia plays it safe and falls back to the pop-rock sound that had been teased in previous releases (and executed with relative success). In Dead End Kings the pop-ish sounds was something like a seasoning, giving the music a well-rounded flavor and creating some ear-worms.
In City Burials, however, the pop sound isn't used as flavoring at all, but rather as the whole dish. This makes up for a rather dull experience, disappointingly. Perhaps Katatonia should be bolder in their approach to this new pop sound, and just release a full blown dark-pop record, instead of playing it safe and releasing a mismatched pop-rock blend. The biggest curse of this record is that it is innofensive. For a band like Katatonia, that simply isn't enough.
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