(2025

After more than a decade, Falling Leaves returns with their second full-length, The Silence That Binds Us, featuring guest appearances by Paul Kuhr (vocalist – Novembers Doom) and renowned session musicians like Fabio Alessandrini (drummer – Bonfire, Annihilator), Ariel Perchuk (keyboards – Kenziner, Roger Staffelbach). Mixed by Alessandro Comerio at Daemon Star Studio in Italy and mastered by the incomparable Dan Swano, the album stands as a mature and emotionally charged testament to the band’s growth and perseverance. The Silence That Binds Us will be out on September 5th.

Now based in Dubai, UAE, Falling Leaves originally emerged from Amman, Jordan to carve out a distinctive niche within the melodic death doom metal genre. Their sound is a tapestry woven with themes central to doom metal—despair, existential dread, and the passage of time—offering heavy yet melodic soundscapes that transcend genre confines to deliver introspective intensity.

The band got their start in the same year with a self-released demo, introducing a sound that was both ethereal and crushing to an emerging fan base. In 2012, they released their debut full-length, Mournful Cry of a Dying Sun, under Endless Winter. Mixed and mastered at Clintworks in Hamburg by Dennis Israel (former assistant to Jens Bogren, famed for work with Opeth and Amon Amarth), the album was enriched by contributions from Paul Kuhr, Pete Johansen (The Sins of Thy Beloved, Morgul, Tristania), and Olof Gothlin (Draconian), surging with waves of emotional and sonic depth.

The upcoming album, The Silence That Binds Us, is a powerful continuation of the band’s legacy. “This album marks an important chapter for us,” the vocalist Bashar Haroun affirms. “After so many years, it feels great to finally share something we truly believe in. Every song reflects a piece of who we are today — honest, emotional, and real.”

The album opens amid the shock of broken trust and memories that wound as deeply as they comfort. It travels through solitude and regret, where absence settles like a weight growing heavier with time. Wounds remain open, and the blur between reality and memory grows until even pain feels like a distant echo. It concludes with Re-Silence (Silence Pt. III), the third and final installment in a long-standing tradition within the band’s discography, where silence once filled with anguish settles into something enduring and unshakable.

The songs unfold with emotive leads and dark, bending chords layered over rich keys and steady, precise drumming — mostly slow, but sometimes breaking out into fierce blast beats. Those rare moments of intensity, paired with pulsating riffs and restless melodies, prevent the sound from slipping fully into funeral doom’s bleakest corners, even though it borrows from that style.

Travis Smith’s haunting tableau of faceless figures tied by invisible threads fits perfectly with Murad Juneydi’s lyrics, which explore anonymity, isolation, and the quiet connections between presence and absence — where silence is both the scar and the solace.

Over a decade after their debut, Falling Leaves returns with “The Silence That Binds Us” a melancholic journey through sorrow, resilience, and the beauty of decay. Blending the heavy weight of doom metal with the emotive depth of melodic death metal, the album delves into themes of loss, memory, and silent battles within.

Bashar Haroun - Vocals
Ala’a Swalha - Guitars
Fadi Stanboulieh - Guitars
Ali M - Bass

Session / Guests:

Paul Kuhr - Guest Vocals (Novembers Doom)
Fabio Alessandrini - Drums (Bonfire, Annihilator)
Ariel Perchuk - Keyboards

Mixed by Alessandro Comerio at Daemon Star Studio (Italy)
Mastered by Dan Swanö at Unisound (Sweden)

Lyrics by Murad Juneydi

Artwork by Travis Smith