mementomori

when and how do I listen to it? well, it's hard for me to wake up in the morning and think "oh, how much I want to listen to soliloquy for lilith today"...with all the things there are to listen to in the world, it inevitably gets pushed aside every time I say to myself "maybe I'll listen to it," then I open the box set, see the three CDs, and, embarrassed by the choice of which one to listen to, I end up putting it back and listening to something else...sometimes it feels like a waste of time...then there’s that rare occasion, like once in a blue moon, when I genuinely feel like listening to it, and in that moment one can touch the sublime, but it really takes a desire and willingness...it’s an experience, and so much depends on the mood; in any case, you always end up doing something else, or reading, or writing, or cleaning the house (though, the melvins are definitely better for cleaning the house!), while even more rarely does the ascetic phase of lying down in bed and enduring it happen...that’s why I didn’t give it a rating, the enjoyment of this work is far too personal...for its conceptual value, it certainly deserves 5 stars, but common sense tells me that time is precious and life is too short to be extravagant...

Hello forevery, I’m responding to your call; it’s always a pleasure to find Sopor Aeternus on the homepage... what can I say, Sopor Aeternus is one of the most complex and sincere characters in the dark/gothic imaginary, his albums are immortal works... he has gone through several phases, but all of them have their reason... this debut, which is actually a collection of various demos/recordings from the early days of his artistic journey, is also an important step in his dazzling career... in it, I still find the dark and post-punk roots that will disappear in the immediately following works, but the pain is already alive and pulsating... a somewhat raw work, at times the recordings are terrible and the naivety/roughness is abundant, but it is precisely in this roughness/primordiality that we find the seeds of true talent... I always enjoy listening to it, and despite some somewhat kitschy baroque elements, I find the tracks very beautiful and heartfelt, at times paying tribute to certain sounds of The Cure, and in others, the Christian Death of Rozz Williams, but everything is already elaborated and sublimated by the artist’s peculiar personality and sensitivity... an album to have, a true essay on malaise, one of the most decayed and gloomy works I’ve ever heard, a decay that will make way for the elegance and refinements of the subsequent works, but no less intense for that. Sopor Aeternus forever! I also believe it would have been necessary to focus on the musical component, while I find the part discussing the artist in general quite didactic... in any case, as long as it’s talked about, that’s fine! Well done, Heaven...

Hi Fallen, I'm not deeply familiar with the lyrics of Sixth Comm, but I can tell you that musically speaking, we are dealing with a genre closer to canonical dark-wave... the military references are therefore much less and much lighter than what happens in the works of Death in June... in short, if you're worried about the right-wing component, you can rest assured, Leagas doesn't seem to be a warmonger to me, and the “martiality” of his sound seems more inherited from the British industrial context of the late seventies... that said, he does perform live in camouflage and with a helmet, but other than that, he doesn't seem to be a crazed revisionist to me (for Death in June, a separate discussion would be needed; even today, it's difficult to define the ideological contours of their thought and artistic message... too complex a character like Pearce to be simply labeled as ideologically aligned...)

Hello everyone. Obviously, the date in the title of the review is wrong, as it refers to September 23rd of last year and not 2007... Hi!

"Lili Marleen (sometimes referenced as Lili Marlene) is a very famous German song, translated into countless languages and become renowned worldwide during World War II.
The original lyrics come from a poem written by a German writer and poet from Hamburg, Hans Leip, a soldier during World War I, before heading to the Russian front in 1915, titled The Song of a Young Sentinel. The poem was part of a volume of poems called Die Harfenorgel. The name "Lili Marleen" comes from that of his girlfriend (daughter of a gardener) combined with the name of a young nurse, Marleen, who seems to have been the girlfriend of a comrade.
Despite the distinctly anti-war nature of the poem, the part about Lili Marleen caught the attention of musician Norbert Schultze, a composer of marches and military songs who was involved with the Nazis, who set it to music in 1937.
The song, however, had a difficult life: it was indeed opposed by the Nazi regime because it was considered defeatist. Nevertheless, or perhaps precisely because of the censorship, it achieved enormous success among soldiers from both sides of the front, who resonated with the story of the soldier thinking of his love far away."

Well, my favorite is Horse Rotorvator and it's not too difficult... otherwise, if you want to start even softer, try listening to the two volumes of Musick to Play in the Dark, which are a bit more atmospheric and reflective... whereas if you like electronic and house music, I recommend Love's Secret Domain, which has a more "dance" vibe... in any case, Coil is more digestible than other industrial stuff... feel free to go ahead...

Ale, the poetic world of Tibet is extremely complex. While it is true that most of its artistic production tends toward heightened drama (and I see no pose in this, precisely because the current is the medium to externalize, for better or worse, one’s inner universe in all its shades)... it is also true that when an artist pours their entire self into a work, they inevitably take themselves seriously. However, the examples you provided already reveal an ironic vein, at times more explicit, at times less so, but one that I continue to find in many lyrics, as well as in certain expressions... after all, we are still talking about dark themes, where certain subjects must predominate, and not about Frank Zappa or Elio e le storie tese, and for this reason, some irony must be sought with a lantern... obvious or not, I believe it’s there, but that’s just my impression; maybe I’m wrong... bye...

Look, I'm in a hurry, but I can tell you that I also think there is a lot of irony within the scene, especially regarding the old school (while the newcomers, as always, don't understand a damn thing, misinterpreting the original message of certain music, and in their serious pose they appear more ridiculous than ever). After all, industrial music itself is born from provocation, sarcasm, irreverence, cynicism, and excess (just think of Throbbing Gristle)... rice, for example, has made me smile (knowingly) more than once, and I’m convinced that for many things he is quite the opportunist, riding certain clichés, believing in them to some extent but also enjoying going overboard... certain photos and specific texts are unequivocal (just think of the photos taken at Disneyland...)... in any case, we shouldn't take them too seriously; they are the first ones not to do so... but even Pearce, Tibet, P. Orridge, Balance, etc. are complex and multifaceted characters, who certainly carry within them a fair dose of agony, but at the same time, I can't say they lack an ironic and disillusioned approach to the world and to themselves... more than many so-called prominent alternative artists do...

I already got the tickets, both for Current on the 22nd and for Nurse With Wound on the 23rd (for those attending both nights it only costs 15 euros, which seems like a very fair price, so I'm giving it a go, even though Turin is not exactly around the corner)... and yes, I'm approaching my 200th review, who knows if it will be the report of the C93 concert...