Reviewed - 08/30/04
Und Wirklichkeit Erfullt Die Seele Wieder
[Black Attakk]
To put this into perspective, Elisabetha attempt to convey some sort of story about a vampire over the course of the 66 minutes this CD runs. "Why," we'll never know. I guess that's not fair. I mean, for all I know this is exactly what a vampire would sound like if he was telling a story. I dunno, I just assumed it would be, ya know, creepy or scary or interesting or something. Well, who am I to judge? Vampires just can't get an even break these days. What with all the Anne Rice novels making them look like sissies, Joss Whedon depicting them as do-gooder lawyers, and Hot Topic putting all their fashion decisions on display for the world to judge. It's gotta be tough.
The problem with this CD is that musically, it's barely musical. It's mainly just a guy talking in German in a cheesy goth voice over slow, atmospheric, cheesy music and cheesy ambient sounds. It's also incredibly repetitious at times. The second track alone goes for ten minutes, but it's only got about two minutes of material to work with - and I'm stretching it when I say it's two minute's worth. It sure prepares you for what to expect, though. I like dark ambient and noise stuff and I'm into some really weird shit, but this just isn't good. This HAS to be a one man project (God help us if it isn't) and this one man is just trying too hard.
Fortunately, the album has some saving graces in the form of actual songs that appear pretty much at random. Tracks #7 and #10 (I'm not writing out the titles, it confuses my Word program) could actually be looked at as serviceable black metal that's just overly atmospheric. Those two tracks show promise. Surprisingly, track #8 works fairly well as a dark ambient/industrial song and brings to mind songs by the masters of horror/dark/industrial Megaptera. Of course, it's also incredibly short, so maybe I'm just happy that it was over so quickly. Yeah, this CD is messing with my sense of musical appreciation, so maybe you shouldn't trust me too much on that one.
As a rule, concept albums are a bad idea. The music often ends up coming second to the concept and that just sucks. Elisabetha take all of that to the extreme as the concept just plain crushes the musical properties and takes on a life of it's own as it runs all caddy-wampus through the village pillaging and raping all in it's path. The music is left in a huddled heap shivering and talking to itself. (In keeping with THAT concept, maybe Elisabetha should do a concept album about Frankenstein's monster. That's basically what happened here.) As it is, track #9 (at a whopping 18 minutes of furious indecision) is the perfect example of what's wrong with this disc. Even when they get some good ideas, it gets all pompous and dumb and sucks the life out of it. Maybe that's the intention, though. It's a story about a vampire after all. Maybe all this sucking is intentional.
Anyway, here's my advice for this band: whatever you're doing on tracks #7 and #10 kinda works. If you released a CD full of songs like #7 and #10 with some interludes like #8, you'd be golden. Explore that further. Seriously, I'd consider actually buying something like that.
[Black Attakk]
To put this into perspective, Elisabetha attempt to convey some sort of story about a vampire over the course of the 66 minutes this CD runs. "Why," we'll never know. I guess that's not fair. I mean, for all I know this is exactly what a vampire would sound like if he was telling a story. I dunno, I just assumed it would be, ya know, creepy or scary or interesting or something. Well, who am I to judge? Vampires just can't get an even break these days. What with all the Anne Rice novels making them look like sissies, Joss Whedon depicting them as do-gooder lawyers, and Hot Topic putting all their fashion decisions on display for the world to judge. It's gotta be tough.
The problem with this CD is that musically, it's barely musical. It's mainly just a guy talking in German in a cheesy goth voice over slow, atmospheric, cheesy music and cheesy ambient sounds. It's also incredibly repetitious at times. The second track alone goes for ten minutes, but it's only got about two minutes of material to work with - and I'm stretching it when I say it's two minute's worth. It sure prepares you for what to expect, though. I like dark ambient and noise stuff and I'm into some really weird shit, but this just isn't good. This HAS to be a one man project (God help us if it isn't) and this one man is just trying too hard.
Fortunately, the album has some saving graces in the form of actual songs that appear pretty much at random. Tracks #7 and #10 (I'm not writing out the titles, it confuses my Word program) could actually be looked at as serviceable black metal that's just overly atmospheric. Those two tracks show promise. Surprisingly, track #8 works fairly well as a dark ambient/industrial song and brings to mind songs by the masters of horror/dark/industrial Megaptera. Of course, it's also incredibly short, so maybe I'm just happy that it was over so quickly. Yeah, this CD is messing with my sense of musical appreciation, so maybe you shouldn't trust me too much on that one.
As a rule, concept albums are a bad idea. The music often ends up coming second to the concept and that just sucks. Elisabetha take all of that to the extreme as the concept just plain crushes the musical properties and takes on a life of it's own as it runs all caddy-wampus through the village pillaging and raping all in it's path. The music is left in a huddled heap shivering and talking to itself. (In keeping with THAT concept, maybe Elisabetha should do a concept album about Frankenstein's monster. That's basically what happened here.) As it is, track #9 (at a whopping 18 minutes of furious indecision) is the perfect example of what's wrong with this disc. Even when they get some good ideas, it gets all pompous and dumb and sucks the life out of it. Maybe that's the intention, though. It's a story about a vampire after all. Maybe all this sucking is intentional.
Anyway, here's my advice for this band: whatever you're doing on tracks #7 and #10 kinda works. If you released a CD full of songs like #7 and #10 with some interludes like #8, you'd be golden. Explore that further. Seriously, I'd consider actually buying something like that.
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Tracklist:
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| Rating: 4/10 | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Release Date: 2004 | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Length: 65:45 | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Review By: K. Ledbetter | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Total Reviews: (1) | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Bands Website: Go Here | ||||||||||||||||||||
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