This full-length follows last year's "Never Fragile" EP from this unique Portuguese act that relies mostly on lush clean guitars, diverse female vocals, flowing bass and synth textures, etc. The cool thing is that they tend to employ different tones and mixes in different songs, so different textures are achieved. For instance, in "Shelter for a Lesser God" the vocals vary from more straightforward singing to operatic styles, the percussion is a bit warmer and appears only in the left speaker (very strange), the bass tone is thicker, and the guitars are layered under lots of delay to create some interesting panning effects. "The Soil Stained Black" has a totally different feel than the other songs, displaying some prog rock inspired synth work, some great guitar leads, whispered vocals, etc. In other instances the drumming plays a lesser role or appears in more rigid (perhaps electronic) form, the vocals can be very out front and operatic or morose and toned down behind the music, the guitars are occasionally dry or acoustic and allow the electronics to create more of the mood, and so on. And with songs ranging from around two minutes to more than seven minutes they definitely cover some ground without straying from their core presence. It's just very laidback music, it's really quite enjoyable if you're more open-minded and into this type of thing. I guess they often get tagged as "darkwave", which means little to me at all as I'm not familiar with such scenes. To me it's just good, melodic music with a somber atmosphere and a great ethereal ambient sort of ring to it. The recording is very nice. Everything sounds full and powerful, there's a great sense of detail to the mix and the tones (as well as the aforementioned experimentation in these departments), and I don't have any real complaints. At times I'd prefer the percussion to be more natural sounding as its rigidity can clash with the flowing compositions, but that's a minor issue. The performances are all flawless in my opinion, especially the vocals, which are far more emotional than most without even needing to rely on excessive harmonization or anything like that. I think I'd also like to hear more of an electronic presence in the future, as they handle those aspects of their work incredibly well. The CD comes in an interesting gatefold digipack where the CD is held in place by a small black foam octagon, which I've never seen before. Most of the imagery is obscured and unrecognizable, with lots of misty red and blue textures mixing together. The lyrics are largely personal and often reference nature in certain forms: "Enter the forest, Touch the universe and all its stars, In all of its subtle charm, And your melancholy eyes will come to realize that an unbridled beauty may grow from this soil stained black, Come with me..." I think the layout could be a bit more interesting, as it's somewhat plain, but it's alright. I'd like to see the use of more bands of sinister yet somehow soothing imagery such as that displayed on the front of the digipack. I can't really compare this to anything because it sounds very original to these ears, but if you're a fan of recent work from The Gathering, as a loose example, then this is absolutely a record worth looking into. Very nice.
[Middle Pillar]
Running time - 53:12, Tracks: 12
[Notable tracks: Shelter for a Lesser God, Silently There, The Lighthouse, The Soil Stained Black]
Middle Pillar Presents - http://www.middlepillar.com
