Forgotten Tomb
Springtime Depression

Before starting the review of this CD, I would like to offer some advice to those who are interested in buying it or have it in their hands still untouched. There are only two possible ways to listen to it: lying down, in complete darkness; or with your cheek pressed against a cold glass, streaked by your tears and the rain.

Herr Morbid has created a dangerous piece of work. Once you completely understand the meaning of the CD, you'll find it hard to listen to anything else. It is simply a drug. The perfect backdrop to a depressed person's despair. Forgotten Tomb skillfully exploited a blend of distorted and clean electric guitars; combining the shouted anger of the former with the bitter sweetness of the latter. Herr Morbid's voice magnificently matches the electric explosions; guitars and singer growl and scream the blackest despair. The drum work is masterful, capable of highlighting with rare skill each passage of this endless agony, now slow and reflective, now fast and destructive.

It must be said: the recording quality also deserves much praise. To be honest, the recurring image in my mind during various listens of the CD is that of a chained and helpless Herr Morbid screaming his rage at the dark vault of a cave. I believe I am not wrong in defining the song lyrics as photos, worn images, captured from the nihilism of time; desolate and sick portraits, backed by an ancient and irreparable bitterness, an extreme desire for death: a longed-for explicit, the end of all suffering. Furthermore, just take a moment with the images of the splendid booklet to understand what I am talking about. 'Springtime Depression' is unique in every part, but perhaps the most emblematic and characterizing track is precisely the title track. The guitar is the only voice of this composition. Sweet, tearful, and reflective, it introduces the listener into a sort of melancholic stasis.

How can we not mention "'l Naufragar m'è dolce in questo mare" by Leopardi? Cradled by an ancestral sea, one abandons oneself to the most intimate and personal reflections of one's being; depression frees every thought in a dangerous and endless vicious circle, frighteningly cynical and destructive. The unexpected variant in explicit introduces a question mark: unanticipated optimism or a sweet remembrance of past things? I will not delve into the other compositions, it is the listener's task to grasp their most intimate nature and make it their own. Their pleasure lies in listening to 'Springtime Depression' in every track and deriving personal reflections from it.

I conclude my review with another piece of advice. Do not rush to understand this work. It will make itself understood. Wait for the opportune moment, wait for that moment of desperation... and it will be there, enclosed in an unsuspecting black plastic disc, ready to trap you, to cradle you, to coax you, in the darkness of its plots.

It will make you its own, with its impotent rage, with its recollections, and with its tears.

[Note from Arkhos: I never give a numerical, geometric, or stellar rating because usually such a rating "spoils" the reading of the review by the average user, please don't hold it against me]