Katatonia
The Black Sessions

THE REVIEW

KATATONIA - The Black Sessions

Label: Peaceville
Year: 2005
Type: Compilation
Contents: 2 CDs + 1 DVD
Genre: Dark Rock/Metal

“Who could see beyond this my darkness?”

I have always detested Greatest Hits, anthologies, and all varieties of compilations.
They almost always represent a deceitful form of record label monetization whose mendacious promotional intent often ignores, or even trivializes, the formative and artistic journey of a band or artist.
The compulsive need for effective marketability forces record labels to choose songs that are formally the most famous and popular, thus violating a repertoire where, alongside the classics, lie often small hidden gems, unfortunately ignored, of albums ideally conceived as cohesive and exclusive works.
The same artwork, which in theory should convey the aesthetic-conceptual imagery of a band, is often neglected and trivialized, effectively reducing the entire operation to a disheartening collection of insignificant photographic images, with the usual contextual information (the canonical notes of production and development).
Sometimes, however, there are bands, like Katatonia, that break this miserable habit, characterizing their compilations with great attention to detail, but above all with such a class that it invests every single aspect of the product, which only in these very rare cases manages to truly represent the necessary compendium to the primary knowledge of the band itself.

Katatonia is an extraordinary band that has been exploring the dark depths of the human soul for years, narrating with sounds and lyrics of extreme sensitivity the hidden paranoias of the mind (“Dance Of December Souls” - 1993), the anxieties of existence (“Brave Murder Day” - 1996), the despair of loneliness (“Discouraged Ones” - 1998), the desolation of defeat (“Tonight’s Decision” - 1999), the awareness of an indissoluble insecurity (“Last Fair Deal Gone Down” - 2001), the fleeting fragility of life (“Viva Emptiness” - 2003), the alienation from an increasingly cold and distant world (“The Great Cold Distance” - 2006).
This compilation follows one year after the release of the previous collection, “Brave Yester Days” (2004), dedicated to the so-called "classic" period of the band, where the language used to narrate darkness was a very personal interpretation of the then-prevailing Gothic-Doom-Death Metal (complete with growling vocals), in a timeframe that went from the demo “Jhva Elohim Meth” (1992) up to the last EP before “Discouraged Ones” (“Saw You Drown” - 1997), obviously passing through the first two albums (“Dance…” and “Brave…”) and other mini releases produced in the meantime (“For Funerals To Come” - 1995, and “Sounds Of Decay” - 1997).
This necessary premise allows us to better understand the nature of this second collection of ours, devoted instead to representing the “modern” period of Katatonia (with clean vocals), from “Discouraged Ones” (1998) up to “Viva Emptiness” (2003), where the sounds are imbued with a Dark Rock/Metal that is sometimes minimalist and hermetic (“Discouraged Ones”), nocturnal and passionate (“Tonight’s Decision”), poetic and intimate (“Last Fair Deal Gone Down”), visceral and deep (“Viva Emptiness”).

Two CDs wisely and sensitively contemplate a journey of unforgettable and sincere sounds and songs, among many important classics, less-known but equally splendid tracks, and numerous hidden gems (all bonus tracks and b-sides released in this period, of which I would highlight the incredible “Sulfur” and the wonderful “Wait Outside”), accompanied by a DVD of a concert held the previous year in Poland, exceedingly significant and moving.
Talking about the individual songs is, in my opinion, impossible (given the quantity, 30 songs + 15 live tracks) as well as unnecessary, but I instead feel compelled to praise the immense splendor of an artwork (by the brilliant artist Travis Smith) and of a simply wonderful and exhaustive booklet, the ideal synthesis of the cultured and refined poetry of the dark "Katatonian" universe.

The only regret clearly remains the absence of the last beautiful album, “The Great Cold Distance” (2006), unfortunately released after the publication of this compilation, but for those who have had the misfortune of discovering Katatonia only with this last record, or worse still for those who do not know them at all, I absolutely recommend turning to this indispensable collection (and then perhaps buying all the other albums as well), to begin a personal journey towards a music that, for once, is not ashamed to present itself as “art.”

CD 1:
01. Teargas
02. Right Into The Bliss
03. Criminals
04. Help Me Disappear
05. Nerve
06. The Future Of Speech
07. Ghost Of The Sun
08. I Am Nothing
09. Deadhouse
10. Passing Bird
11. Sleeper
12. Sulfur
13. No Devotion
14. Chrome
15. A Premonition

CD 2:
01. Dispossession
02. Cold Ways
03. Nightmares By The Sea
04. O How I Enjoy The Light
05. Evidence
06. March 4
07. I Break
08. For My Demons
09. Omerta
10. Tonight’s Music
11. Stalemate
12. Wait Outside
13. Fractured
14. Sweet Nurse
15. Black Session

DVD (Live in Poland):
01. Ghost Of The Sun
02. Criminals
03. Teargas
04. I Break
05. I Am Nothing
06. Sweet Nurse
07. Tonight's Music
08. For My Demons
09. Chrome
10. Future Of Speech
11. Complicity
12. Burn The Remembrance
13. Evidence
14. Deadhouse
15. Murder