Artist: Corpus Principium
Title: Shades Of Melancholy
Type: 7” demo
Label: Radical Matters

For the purpose of this review, there are two types of music; there’s the type of music you listen to and there’s the type of music you experience. The kind that really gets inside your brain and fucks with it a little, which is precisely what Shades Of Melancholy does. Sadly there are only two tracks on this EP, one of which is a cover but it certainly gives a good idea what this band are all about and leaves me thirsty for more. Dark and ritualistic, the rhythm barely rises above a foreboding murmur and you can practically smell the incense and make out the black hooded figures bathed in a candlelit glow. The ethereal wails and weeps of A’ano’Nin are really quite chilling; there are no vocals in the traditional sense but the indistinct noises that emerge from her voice really add to the aura sounding like tortured and lost souls trying to make contact with the world of the living.

‘Immortal Manifestation, Finsternis’ has more of an industrial clang behind its depressive foreground though again this is all about the sinister, ritualistic ambience and this is seriously hypnotic stuff that could quite easily have me in a trancelike state if it went on much longer. Originally done by Darkness Enshroud, the vocals here are somewhat less Gothic than the original and more like what has me thinking of a ghostly Japanese schoolgirl with strong psychotic tendencies; there’s that sugary innocent coating that you just know is hiding something seriously sinister and not quite right.

I sincerely adored these two tracks! They both have a slightly different angle yet have a highly ritualistic feel and are drenched in a really creepy atmosphere. Can’t wait for a full length!

http://www.myspace.com/corpusprincipium