Neurot Recordings has proven to be one of the leading labels of the 21st century, delivering valuable and sensible music. Neurosis, on the other hand, is one of the milestones in the company's catalogue. They are even the basis on which younger bands like Isis and Pelican step on nowadays, just like Neurosis themselves stepped on Black Sabbath... but who hasn't, anyway... The contemporary “heirs”, however, are more post-rock influenced, while Neurosis are simply a doom band, although flavoured with popular music streams. What we’ve got here is everything that’s always been typical for Neurosis - apocalyptic soundscapes, tribal drums, lyrical mood, gloom... “Given to the Rising” is emotionally diverse, but not colourful... more like gray, embracing the whole black-and-white spectrum. This is maybe one of the most varied doom albums ever released, shrouding all of the genre’s faces in 70 minutes. Sabbath-esque riffs all the way, significant post-rock sounds in the intro to “To the Wind” (and not only there), cold, chaotic and psychedelic, mechanic-like drone in “At the End of the Road”, short, poetic and schizophrenic noir lyricism in “Shadow” and “Nine”, the cosmic odyssey “Distill (Watching the Swarm)”... All these form “Given to the Rising” – a doomed diversity at its best. The louder you listen to this album, the deeper it takes you. And, believe me, there is definitely some depth in there... If you're not that big fan of doom, the duration of some of the songs may bore you a bit, but, as a matter of fact, plenty of present-day musicians got used to perform as painters with their instruments, drawing vast panoramic audio-views... However, have in mind that Neurosis are better in what they're doing than most of the rest.