Ebbene sì! Anche io sono stato un fan dei mestissimi My Dying Bride! Poi cosa accadde di preciso? Ah sì! Accadde che, per una lunga serie di motivi, quel suono tenebroso e monolitico iniziò a sembrarmi fin troppo melodrammatico e piagnucolone.
Intendiamoci: dischi come "As The Flowers Withers" e "The Angel And The Dark River" rimangono pietre miliari in ambito death-doom! Il controverso "34.788 %.. Complete" lo considero un coraggioso tentativo di rinnovamento ma quello che, con immensa fatica, la sposa morente pubblicò dal '98 in poi mi è sempre apparso fin troppo vincolato da noiosi ed ammuffiti clichè.
"Songs Of Darkness, Words Of Light" ben esprime questa cronica mancanza di idee. Soliti riffs, lenti e depressivi, solita voce a metà tra un growler metallico ed un Nick Cave (ultima maniera s'intende!!), il magico violino di Martin Powell sostituito da pacchiane tastiere e dei testi che, col senno di poi, fanno sbellicare dalle risate!
Sono stato un pò troppo stronzo? Proprio per niente. Prendete il testo di "My Wine In Silence" e, dopo averlo letto con attenzione, ditemi per quale motivo un poeta maledetto come Aaron Staintrophe s'è ridotto a scrivere queste ovvietà! Soldi? Macchè! Si tratta, piuttosto, di sterilità compositiva.
Se in "The Dreadful Hours" compariva qualche elemento di interesse, nell'ascolto di questo dischetto ci troviamo di fronte ad uno sconfortante tentativo di "recupero" di sonorità già proposte ed ampiamente sperimentate durante il corso degli anni novanta. "My Wine In Silence", come precedentemente evidenziato, ma anche brani quali "Catherine Blake" e "The Wrekage Of My Flesh" non aggiungono nulla di nuovo ed anzi ci fanno dubitare non poco riguardo lo stato di salute della band.
Un paio di brani carini ci sono ("The Blue Lotus" e "A Doomed Lover"), ma l'atmosfera di "scazzo" compositivo che regna sovrana non favorisce l'ascolto di questa release.
Katatonia e Anathema sono riusciti a rinnovarsi. Forse non sempre in maniera convincente, questo è vero, ma lo hanno fatto con coraggio e maturità. I Bride, putroppo, hanno preferito battere il solito terreno e questa scelta, a lungo andare, si è rivelata poco convincente.
Un vero peccato!
Elenco tracce testi samples e video
03 Catherine Blake (06:36)
So vile men's torment was truly a pleasure
A plain that would change mankind for ever more
Catherine Blake slept fitfully in the
summer night. In the heat.
She murmured gently and moved smoothly,
this way and that. Oh, the beauty.
Her luscious eyes, delicate fingers,
clawed at her sodden bed.
Catherine smiled. Took a fabulous breath
of summer air and tasted death.
Die Erorians' visit had been successful rewarding.
With night of female screams of whimpers,
lustful dreams.
Night followed rampant night of
delicate soft gasps.
The ultimate attack on Heaven and it's glories.
Seduce them as they slept, oblivious to
their midnight tryst.
The seed of doom was planted.
Phantom raped in their dreams.
The sad ones take their own lives.
Slay their men night after night.
Catherine Blake dreamt of a horror.
Of passion too and of terror.
Over her silent breast, shadows swept,
shades caressed.
Motherhood was destroyed by the seed
and laid to waste.
A great rift was born. Men and the
world were torn.
The daggers went in deep, vile and sickening.
Women swept awat all infancy from their wombs.
And still the Lord God remained silent,
no utterance, no movement, no tears.
The earth became red.
The cutting machines of man.
Disgust and hatred for the lives of woman.
The butchery, the savagery,did spill
unto themselves.
A chorus of agony from Heaven and Rain poured
In a colossus of angels tears.
The creature of all sins. The lord of the
bleakest abode.
Did wonder at the silence.
What did the Almighty know?
All Hell did fill with the screaming souls
of dead men.
The mighty army of God did stand and wait,
Hoping our lord would unleash them all.
The great fiery pit. Hordes ripped apart.
Chaos ensued, screaming from the dark.
Observing his darkened child, in the miserable
corners of earth
The great heart of God will heal up the earth.
The Lord watched as his beloved slipped silently
Back into the darkness below.
06 The Blue Lotus (06:37)
Under the darkened, Ancient oak
Gentle in the nights breeze
I stop and stare, rest a while
With hands upon my knees
Through jaded leaves, bush and scrub
I spy my journeys end
Black it looms, silent gloom
The castle called Avend
On I trot, past forest eyes
Past horrors of the night
Through the dark, I see a sign
A gentle glowing light
Upon reaching the castle I ascend the ivy
Towards the golden window
My heart pounds my breath is rushed
As I fight both brick and branch
The ledge is mine and over I sweep
Silent like the falling snow
Quiet, I slip across the polished floor
Tonight, I will dine with chance
The Blue Lotus, a legend, I thought a myth
Old poems and stories gone
A beauty of unimaginable lust
Both men's hearts, and Gods, were won
Skin like milk, an angels face
Thay say her smile could kill
Her hair the blackest of all black
Stories I thought Though, still
So there she lay spleeping upon the bed
Half covered by fantastic silks
Her breast I see, moves with her dreams
A sight I will always recall
A single candle that showed me the way
Through forest, river and hills
Glows upon that lovely skin
Shadows dancing aroun the walls
Closer I creep, toward my prize
The Blue Lotus lies before me
Her lips are full, red as blood
Moist as they invite me
Stoop I did to kiss those lips
In that glowing room
When suddenly, she did awake,
Her eyes filled with doom
From silks, her hands were round my neck
Escape there was no hope
A brief flash of teeth is all I saw
And gone was my throat
Her bloodlust deep, she swallowed me
Red was all I saw
She drank her fill and watched me fall
Gently to the floor
A league away my death is found
By locals who tens this land
Who lay me down in shllow earth
A single Lotus placed in my hand
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Altre recensioni
Di Norvheim
Ogni singola nota è come una coltellata dritta nello stomaco per pesantezza, ossessività e disperazione.
L'ultima traccia A Doomed Lover è l'epitaffio di ogni speranza; urla lancinanti di dolore e rassegnazione.
