Harvest of Seasons is introduced by a very nice instrumental. On this track we can hear dark / ambient keyboards, acoustic guitars and wave or wind samplings. The listener is lured into hoping this is some great Black Metal with ambiences, perhaps some acoustic guitars and the likes, but no, it is not like that.
Black Lotus is more a Vintersorg/Borknagar type of band. The clean vocals are what made me immediately think of Vintersorg. At the beginning, they seemed not as annoying as that Swedish act, although after a while, I grew tired of them. Beside, they are simply useless. This is bombastic Black Metal recorded with a muddy sound production. On the first row, you have the vocals, bass and drums. Second row, the keyboards, and then, buried in the mix, the guitar work. I don't think that is a proper way to make a Black Metal album. The keyboards are maybe the only instrument in their right place. The compositions themselves are not bad at all, they just don't vary too much from one song to the next, and thus redundancy settles in. Bombastic metal is not the best treatment for Black Metal as far as I'm concerned. There are few moments of calmer modes with more harmonies and ambiences on songs like "Statues in Auburn", "Terra Hiberna" and closing track. A certain epic edge is floating around on this release, on a brighter note.
Harvest of Seasons could have been more interesting. Next time around, please drop some blast beats, cut the clean vocals and get a good production.