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Rating: I searched for a long time for an introduction to this piece of writing. I'd think of something and immediately say to myself, "No, what a crap." I'd write it down and immediately delete it, telling myself, "No, what a crap."
Perhaps because, simply, there is no adequate introduction; just as there is no closure, adequate or not.
Much can be said about this album, but nothing would be right.
The only right thing is silence. The silence that during the 45 minutes of duration you will never hear for more than a second, but after those 45 minutes will be infinite, perpetual, deafening, annoying. Finding more security in the chaotic and infernal world of Converge, rather than in the tranquil one of reality.
A work that transcends words. Even those, if they really exist, of the songs. Jacob Bannon screams in an incomprehensible manner, not of this world. He wrote lyrics, also included in the booklet, but when it came time to sing them, he threw them away, saying screw it. And he only screamed to the world all the pain and despair that was brooding within him.
One of those works that hurt, not only inside. First and foremost to those who created it.
"Dear, I'll stay gold just to keep these pasts at bay
To keep the loneliest of nights from claiming you
and to keep these longest of days from waking you
For I felt the greatest of winters coming."
"Concubine" comes in and within three seconds the listener, and the world as they knew it, is annihilated. Catapulted, instead, into the world composed of disturbing black and apocalyptic visions of Converge.
No hope left.
"I'll lay waiting, just waiting for my time to come."
An inferno. An inferno to pay.
"Cheap lips, soft eyes, lost in the most blinding lights
As cold as those first nights alone
As the second best he'll become
Sleep deep, girl, dream well
Just sleep, girl, just dream well."
Condemned to never be able to go back. What was known before, now no longer exists.
"I lay claim to this day - No love, no hope
I've lost count of the second chances
I lay claim to this day - No love, no hope."
Trapped in a dimension on the thin line between reality and mad abstraction. Without love, without any hope.
In the darkness where one searches for meaning, when all one is looking for is something, anything.
A desire to get out, knowing you can't.
When the only possible thing is to wait.
"Lost in you like Saturday nights
Searching the streets with bedroom eyes
Just dying to be saved."
Only with death is it possible to be saved and get out. It is for that one waits.
The fade out of "Jane Doe" sounds like a catharsis, after which only the terrifying silence from which one was fleeing remains.
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
01 Concubine (01:19)
Dear, I'll stay gold just to keep these pasts at bay
To keep the loneliest of the nights from claiming you
and to keep these longest day from waking you
For I felt the greatest of winters coming
and I saw you as seasons shifting from blue to gray
Thats where the coldest of these days await me
and distance lays her heavy head beside me
There Ill stay gold, forever gold
02 Fault and Fracture (03:05)
You were most beautiful as the damage and the trauma
Pounding hard with battered wings of destiny
You were my last great war
You were my heaven ablaze
Riddled with faults and fractures
And I spent my last of days burning my oldest of bridges
And I spent my last of nights killing the best of friends
In the company of thieves, liars, beggers and whores
I'll lay waiting, just waiting for my time to come
03 Distance and Meaning (04:17)
And like that heart that got in the way
I'll become the lost cause
The child of burden and rage
Like the distance in your touch
Like the years we burned down
I heard that phone call
The hesitation, the ackward silence
I felt everything in those seconds
Splinters of sentence and heartless advice
Nothing's changed but these days entwined
05 Homewrecker (03:51)
I have bled and I have given
the longest of rivers and the longest of ropes
And you're not grasping and my light is sinking on the horizon
Knee deep among your wreckage and uncertainty
With anguish my crown and heartbreak my throne
I lay claim to this day - No love, no hope
I've lost count of the second chances
I lay claim to this day - No love, no hope.
06 The Broken Vow (02:13)
Those nights we had and the trust we lost
The sleep that fled me and the heart I lost
It all reminds me just how callous
and heartless the true cowards are
And I write this for the loveless
And for the risks we take
I'll take my love to the grave
As tired and worn it is
I'll take my love to the grave
07 Bitter and then Some (01:27)
Death to cowards, traitors, and empty words
To those adorned with the touch of rose petals
And the blessed gift of forgetfulness
For these are your years and days to outshine
Push on and soar higher
This is your memory, your everything, and the in-between
Push on and soar higher
08 Heaven in Her Arms (04:00)
Death was just a simple glance across a dim lit room
And those eyes did it
Those three words did it
Those three words killed him
And I surrender to it all
Between you and me, I surrender to you
Forgive me for the sadness
And the bringing of you down
I just needed a lover and I needed a friend
And there you were
Running from forever like all the rest
Three simple words bled me dry
Three simple word bled us dry, bled us dry
I love you
09 Phoenix in Flight (03:48)
And I write this to you my dear
For your eyes alone
I'm out of heart and these tanks are low
So cast your days to flame
And set your phoenix to flight
Let her turn to ash
Among those flourescent lights
Let your love drift deeper
Let her wings catch the sky
Just remember my name, girl
And remember what died
11 Thaw (04:29)
In the want, the need, and this desperation
You'll find me as the time-bomb
As the last great stand in this history
When all our roads have been travelled
And all have come to a most bitter end
Today I thaw
12 Jane Doe (11:33)
These floods of you are unforgiving
Pushing passed me spilling through the banks
And I fall
Faster than light and faster than time
That's how memory works
At least in the dark where I'm searching for meaning
When I'm just searching for something
I want out
Out of every ackward day
Out of every tongue tied loss
I want out
Out of the burdening nightsweats
Out of the rising seas of blood
Lost in you like saturday nights
Searching the streets with bedroom eyes
Just dying to be saved
Run on girl, run on
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Other reviews
By Fraska!
Listening to Converge is a mystical journey, an erratic ascent and descent.
"Jane Doe" is universally (and rightfully) considered the masterpiece of the Boston band.
By Hybris
This CD is alive. It speaks to you. Caresses your face, but hides a blade between its fingers.
Jane Doe screams whispering to our ears. To our brains. To our souls.
