Apparently this album has taken eight years too get to this stage, due too various members touring duties and such, and completes the third part of a trilogy with which I have no previous acquaintance. So starting from the top this is another project group with more guests than you can pack into an after gig party, but that centres on the inimitable IT from Vondur and Abruptum which means generally it will be worth a peek just because of his involvement, and Michael Bohlin of Pain, who also handles production duties and Johan Husgafvel (also Pain) and Zacharias Ahlvik. So industrial, cosmic metal is the order of the day.
The good: The production is excellent for this type of music; bright, sharp and heavy on the rhythm when the songs get going to lend that heavy ebm sound and they keyboards during the ambient/progressive interludes are well used as (I presume) spoken words fill in the story. It is as well laid down as you would expect from musicians like this, and the vocals add a much needed layer of idiosyncrasy to the proceedings.
I say much needed because that is where the problems start. If I tell you that on first listening by far away the best song is a rather fine metalised cover of Depeche Mode’s ‘Walking In My Shoes’ that isn’t part of the album proper you may get the idea. So I go back and replay the album a few times.
I mean this should work: Those vocals with weird cosmic lyrics and a pounding industrial metal engine room? Alas no, not for me. Opening song ‘Teonanacatl (Flesh Of The Gods)’ is loud and gives a good machine driven battering but fails to rattle me enough and no hooks sink in. The follow up ‘Perfectly Wrong’ has a nifty 90s style industrial chorus which perks me up considerably but flounders a little in the verse. Still, not bad just not that good. ‘Precession Of The Equinoxes’ keeps to this kind of 90s sounds with the modern production and yet again isn’t bad and the lyrics are quite neat. It threatens to break into a full on ebm stomp but seems to hesitate and shies away which is a little disappointing, as though it’s holding back somehow. ‘ID Zero’ is considerably better with an animie-esque intro and a slower pace tied to an atmospheric melody and the robotic rhythm with dramatic operatic downward keyboard flourishes. ‘Safety Exit’ though for all its effective high drama stylings comes across as an exposition piece for the storyline, the bane of all concept albums. Somehow I find this all a bit disjointed, a cut and paste of good ideas and often pretty good parts of songs which might be explained by its extended genesis. ‘Plumed Serpent Rise’ is a bit of a dull clatter for example, if I’m honest, whereas the vocoder driven ‘Ekpyrosis’ is a far better hammer of martial strikes and great vocals but still falls a little short of enthusiasm. The title track showcases another lovely keyboard intro which is a good mood piece, and short closer ‘The Eight Sins Pt III’ lets us out with a final burst of industrial anger.
After that we have the aforementioned Depeche Mode cover, a pretty pointless cover of ‘Black Metal’ and some remixes.
The issue is that as an album this feels like a communal musical book where the time taken to put it together has dulled the passion for it too much and where the songs themselves overall are just are not strong enough to carry the structure individually. There is no sense of verve, and despite a good production to much energy had leaked away for it to ever fully engage me. Its sad because with the expressive vocals and the quality of musicians this should have been so much more. This should have leapt out at me with all the over the top engagement of someone like (too pull one bit of galactic ebm from my current playlist) Hanzel Und Gretel but it is just sapped of that kind of excitement. If you are a fan of Vondur or Pain give it a listen anyway, you never know it may grab you after all. I just can’t be enthusiastic about this I’m afraid.
(5/10 Gizmo)
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