Only recently did I discover the band Klimt1918 with their latest album ‘Just in case we’ll never meet again’ and its beautiful sounds rather struck a chord with me. With ¾’s of Klimt1918 also playing in The Foreshadowing I was especially excited to hear this album; it’s their second one but somehow the last one managed to slip by me unnoticed. For the uninitiated, this band is much more, for want of a better description, metallic than the shoegazing indie of Klimt…highly melodic, but crushingly heavy at the same time.
It’s very easy to like this album, especially if you are in the sort of mood to let cascades of melancholia wash over you while just laying back drowning your sorrows in a bottle of wine. A prominent drum march leads us to ‘The Dawning’ where it instantly becomes apparent what we are in for here. Beautiful melodies and crushing guitars give a real oppressive sense of Northern misery; there are shades of Paradise Lost and streaks of Anathema here for sure as well as more Finnish influences such as Katatonia and Swallow The Sun. ‘Outsiders’ especially has a Jonas Renkse-esque croon to the vocal delivery, while musically this has that kind of wistful, comforting sense of misery. There are some lovely guitars to be heard on this album that are both strong and yet ethereal at the same time. They occasionally have that hypnotic, trance-inducing sound that fans of Klimt1918 will recognise.
‘Oionos’ has a really dark and heavy verse with a far bassline and some crushing guitars, while the vocals are passionate and have a flowing, Gothic romanticism to them. The sound is rather moody in places, especially on ‘Soliloquium’ with its gentle, repetitive guitars and Gregorian chanting and on tracks 6 and 7, ‘Lost Humanity’ and ‘Survivors Sleep’ the vocals seem to take on a more 80s darkwave feel, the deep bellows instantly bringing to mind Depeche Mode or even Bauhaus, while the latter has a really stunning piano melody and is a particularly gloomy acoustic moment.
‘Hope, She’s In The Water’ has a lovely etherealness to it, starting off with some atmospheric keyboards and spaced out guitars that gradually builds in strength and climbs out from the water, leading into an excellent cover of Sting’s ‘Russians’ which is actually one of my favourite moments on the album and is nothing short of stunning. At times I have to wonder if this is a bit of a concept album; there’s just a vibe that comes across recurrently on here that has me thinking its to do with war; from the drumming at the start, to the President Bush samples to some of the song titles; Survivors Sleep, Chant of Widows, etc. I could be wrong and most likely my overactive imagination at work yet again. Anyway, this is a well crafted album that comes highly recommended to any fan of Gothic doom.
http://www.myspace.com/theforeshadowing
