As is our musical nerd sort of way I was as per usual over-analysing things whilst listening to this. As far as sub-genres are concerned we have more than enough as it is but with black metal there could easily be a clearly divisible line differentiating between two types, the nasty and the nice. Before you run off laughing let me try and explain. The nasty speaks for itself, the anti-humanist brigade dealing with war, the horrors of humanity & the hate. It’s easy to see and hear and if you think along the terms of bands such as Marduk, Tsjuder and Gorgoroth as examples it is really quite clearly defined. On the nice side and yes the irony of calling black metal such is not lost, are those that look back at things with emphasis on nature and the beauty of the world, these are normally the more atmospheric sounding bands of the ilk and those that add more textures to their sound and do not just go all out to destroy but maybe create music that is much easier to absorb and lose yourself in. Of course you have those that sit left of centre over that imagined line, those of a perhaps DSBM nature and to the right of it with the dissonant and furrowing cleavers but before I go completely off topic it did all suddenly make some sort of sense to me.
Austrian outfit Ellende definitely sit in the nice camp and that is seriously no disservice to them. Formed and revolving around Lukas Gosch of Svarta as his solo project this is the 3rd album from them. Although Lukas is responsible for everything we hear on disc the project has expanded for live activities featuring musicians from bands such as Nekrodeus & Norikum. Lebensnehmer is my 1st encounter with them and I have to say it has been a more than pleasurable one; there we go using words of positivity with black metal again. There is an instant air of nostalgia and even romanticism on the simply entitled intro here but the gorgeous album cover hints at something much deeper and does suggest war. I have no ideas on any narrative here other than that and translating titles, the album name is thusly ‘Life Taker’ and track titles such as ‘A Piece Of Despair’ and ‘You would make a beautiful corpse’ are pretty suggestive of what is going on here. There is perhaps beauty in death and decay though and the neo-classical overtures draped in black here are very much suggestive of such things, loss, solemnity and despair are all etched within the musical mainframe.
There is plenty of drama, sturm und drang within the album to keep everything flowing and numbers such as Augenblick have moments of serious drive and tempestuousness about them as well as everything previously mentioned. Vocals are thick and thorny and melody is incredibly strong. The acoustic interludes which are often included on the album are what really allow it to breathe and very much the point of what made me think of this as nice as they gently roll over me, expanding the musical template. At times I am reminded of groups such as Imperium Dekadenz especially on the very catchy ‘Die Wege,’ a number that has stood out and had me expectantly waiting for it every time I have played the album. The musicianship here is excellent and whereas some solo projects are hoisted by their own petard with no one to hamper in and add a sense of reason to their creators ideas, here everything flows magnificently. I really like the acoustic sparkle of instrumental ‘Ein Stück Verzweiflung’ once the bass drops in on it the melody reminds a bit of Bauhaus classic ‘All We Ever Wanted Was Everything’ and once that thought came to my head I couldn’t shift it. The track is, well nice! Savagery is not too far away with a massive drum assault on the next track ‘Der Blick wird leer’ but still once dispensed with there is an almost folky melody presenting itself as the musical gracefully flows.
A title translating to ‘Caressing The Ice Wind’ does exactly what one would hope and expect, the instrumental cold and glittering, giving visions of stars in the night sky over a sombre reflective terrain; much no doubt like that of the corpses freezing on the album cover itself. With a couple of epic tracks left Lebensnehmer proves itself as a weighty listen with plenty of great ideas running through its absorbing 50 minute running time. As far as I am concerned this was a great introduction to Ellende and their back catalogue is one that I definitely need to find time to explore.
(8/10 Pete Woods)
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