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I Candlemass sono un gruppo, che per gli amanti dell'heavy rock più cupo ed oppressivo, ha bisogno di poche presentazioni, sono infatti ritenuti non ha torto i fondatori del doom o almeno tra coloro che ne hanno delineato sonorità e tematiche.
Gran merito del gruppo è stato quello di aver riportato in auge le sonorità sabbathiane più cupe (per intenderci quelle di album come il primo omonimo, "paranoid" e "master of reality"), che erano state relegate in secondo piano dalla seconda metà degli anni 70 fino a metà anni 80. Parallelamente a ciò che fecero i Kyuss negli anni 90 (seguendo però un percorso diverso), essi riuscirono a riproporre i riff sabbathiani in un contesto attuale e ad un pubblico giovane, senza risultare stantiii e soprattutto non risultando delle copie dei Black Sabbath, anzi divenendo loro stessi seminali per un intero genere e modelli da imitare. Da questo punto di vista la proposta dei Candlemass può essere inquadrata, come già detto, facendo riferimento ai primi Black Sabbath, aggiungendo a ciò una matrice heavy ed atmosfere epiche che distinguono il gruppo svedese da tutte le altre band Doom.
"Ancient Dreams" è il terzo album, il secondo con Messiah Marcolin alla voce. Non ha certamente lo stesso valore storico dei due precedenti lavori, ma non è assolutamente inferiore. L'unico difetto secondo me è la produzione, a mio parere (passatemi il termine) "asciutta", che rende il suono poco profondo, ma tutto ciò diviene un piccolo dettaglio compensato dal solito elevato standard compositivo delle canzoni.
Rispetto al precedente "Nightfall", le atmosfere si fanno leggermente più cupe, anche perchè l'imponente Messiah Marcolin spesso canta su tonalità più basse rispetto a quelle del precedente album, come risulta ad esempio nella bellissima title track, aperta da un riff funereo e da un ritornello cupo e molto evocativo, prerogativa questa comunque tipica di molti brani dei Candlemass, basti pensare al ritornello altrettanto evocativo di "the bells of Acheron", ai riff scarni e oppressivi di "incarnation of evil". Il brano di apertura "mirror mirror", risulta invece il più diretto, aperto da un riff spezzato a cui fa seguito la strofa "mirror mirror on the wall..." che rimane impressa sin dal primo ascolto.
Insomma tutti i brani sono una buona sintesi di come dovrebbe suonare un album doom e soprattutto danno un senso di soddisfazione e di appagamento che solo chi conosce il genere può capire.
Non posso che chiudere con una frase degli stessi Candlemass contenuta come dedica nel loro primo album storico "epicus doomicus metallicus", che inquadra la loro musica e filosofia di vita:
"all'odio, all'amarezza, alla sofferenza, agli scoraggiamenti e alle sbornie: senza di voi questo disco non sarebbe stato possibile"
Elenco tracce testi samples e video
01 Mirror Mirror (06:16)
Mirror, mirror upon the wall
Magic demon eye
A realm of madness
Awakened by the call
Speak the ancient words of mages
Try to take control
The essence of evil,
A challenge for your soul
The battle of minds
The riddle the rhymes
Beware of the darkness behind
Usurped and enslaved
Redeemed and betrayed
The devil in the mirror, obey!
Iridescent pulsation light
Glowing in its heart
The surface is reflecting
Nightmares of your mind
Green mist swirling deep within
A dark dimension takes from
The grip of clawed hands drags you inside
Enchanted with powers to conquer your soul
Good or evil it won`t mind
The mirror of darkness is blind
Feel the presence, the voice of the dark
Break the balance, intrudes your mind
Try to deny, oh master of fools
Captured forever, the loser learns the rules
02 A Cry From the Crypt (07:25)
Hear the cry
The cry of tormented pain
A voice darker than Evil
The deadly moaning of hell
Oh no!
The unborn has tasted no life
Sharing the rest of the dead
Not aware that the years that go by
Lurking in the shadows
Twisted shape of creeping terra
Guarding something special
Gone since ages, dead and buried
Dead and buried
There`s a cry from the crypt
It has been there for a thousand years
A lonely, lost and suffering soul
Shedding all its black tears
Faithful beyond death
Cries of pain you hear
From the crypt below
The one the being loved so much
Has turned into dust
03 Darkness in Paradise (06:47)
I`m standing here in silence
This graceful place of peace
Watching the shadows come closer
The birds they sing no longer
The winds they blow no more
With fear of death
I`m waiting for the night to fall
The sun will set forever
One after one the stars they die
The rainbow has turned to black
Darkness has fallen in paradise
Love is lost in memories
All beauty and all light
Have vanished from the
Garden of delight
The Devil and his gift
The heart he stole away
But innocence was lost long before
The morning will come no more
Our dreams are all gone
Midnight has come to stay
Darkness has fallen in paradise
Oh father please forgive us
Forgive us all our sins
Please bring your light
Again to lead our way
But my prayers are not answered
They fade out to die
And so does the last gleam of hope
The morning will come no more
Our dreams are all gone
Midnight has come to stay
Darkness has fallen in paradise
I know my death is near
Far beyond my dreams
My fate is waiting
To show me the light... I believe
Darkness is fallen in paradise
05 Bearer of Pain (07:22)
Once a year the white robes go on a quest
In search of a virgin, a child of innocence
Born of Apollon divine is the heritage
Chosen by foe to accomplish a holy task
Bearer of pain, Bearer of pain
Lighten the burdens of woe
Bearer of pain, Bearer of pain
Heal the wounds of the city
Up in the tower, the nerve of the city so high
Treated like a princess,
But imprisoned by the will of her fate
Concentrating, feeling the pain how it flows
Through the walls of the city into her soul
I bear your weight upon my shoulders
I bleed for you and pray
I hear your moaning in my mind
I comfort night and day
From my tower to your foundations
My soul reaches through your walls
Market square of guarded bastions
I answer to your calls
The tears of the city wiped away by summer breeze
The pain is lightened by sweet, sweet dreams
The cries of despair are silenced with a lullaby
Sleep my child, I`m with you, we are one
Now a year her chamber is opened again
Led by servants, the old one is barely sane
Marked by her burdens, the guardian can finally rest
Replaced by another, carrying on the continuing test
06 Ancient Dreams (07:04)
Reach deep within where reality is hard to find
Search in the corners of the winding mazes of your mind
Seek out the treasures that open doors that some keep sealed
Believe in your dreams and a wonderworld will be revealed
Come to the boundless land somewhere inside your fantasies
Built by dreams and magic the secret place that none have seen
Chase the horizons, catch the illusion
Remember the child within
There`s no tomorrow just sadness and sorrow
Hold on to the ancient dreams
Great kings and tyrants, unicorns and elflords
Devils and demons, dungeons and dragons
Phoenix is rising up from the ashes in the wind
Born into glory, then back to ashes once again
High flies the dragon, the ruler of the seven skies
Riding the winds, not knowing that he just can`t die
Chase the horizons, catch the illusion
Remember the child within
There`s no tomorrow just sadness and sorrow
Hold on to the ancient dreams
See how the wizard cast his spell with maddened eyes
Using his magic to reach the heavenly skies
Witness the alchemist turning all his lead to gold
Try after try, begging that his fantasy will hold
See how the rainbow bends it shape into the sea
Follow the sign and your dreams will be reality
Chase the horizons, catch the illusion
Remember the child within
There`s no tomorrow just sadness and sorrow
Hold on to the ancient dreams
07 The Bells of Acheron (05:20)
A distant calling
A faint echo form the past
The bells are still tolling
The message of sadness and death
In the city of Acheron
The priests burned the Book
Worshipped false Gods
Scoffed at the good
Desecrated the altar
Spat on the cross
Teared down the temples
And laughed at their loss
Oh faith... oh faith...
Stone on stone
The ringing goes on and on
Attracting a memory
Forgotten and nowhere to be found
Forged by the mighty
Admired by the great
Once blessed by the holy
Protected by fate
Announcing the twilight
The wrath of the Gods
The city of Acheron
Was drowned by the flood
The bells of Acheron
08 Epistle No. 81 (04:37)
[4:30] Mark how our shadow, Mark Movits mom frere One small darkness encloses How gold and purple that shovel there To rags and rubbish disposes Charon beckons from tumultuous waves Then trice this ancient digger of graves For thee ne'er grapeskin shall glister Wherefore my Movits come help me to raise A gravestone over our sister Even desirous and modest adobe Under the sighing branches Where time and death, a marriage forebode Twixt beauty and ugliness ashes To thee ne'er jealousy findeth her way Nor happiness footstep, swift to stray Flitteth amid these barrows E'en enmity armed, as thou seest this day Piously breaketh her arrow The little bell echoes the great bells groan Robed in the door the precentor Noisome with quiristers prayerful moan Blesses those, who enter The way to this templed city of tombs Climbs amid roses yellowing blooms Fragments of mouldering biers Till black-clad each mourner, His station assumes Bows there deeply in tears
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