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Few people are familiar with Kirlian Camera, an electronic music project born in 1980 in Parma.
Spawned from the mind of Angelo Bergamini, keyboardist/programmer and vocalist, Kirlian have lasted until today, oscillating more or less steadily between technopop, EBM, and dark folk.
During the glorious eighties, they tried to ride the big wave: their first 12-inch is considered a classic of Italo Disco, as well as their legendary appearance at Festivalbar.
Ten years ago, this album was released: Pictures from Eternity, considered by many to be a small gem of electronic dark.
Someone copied it for me on cassette when I still knew nothing about them, needless to say, I liked them immediately, and the tape went into heavy rotation for a long period in my life.
So much so that even today, after having listened to most of their discography, I consider this their best album.
The time for a review seems ready, so let's start with the cover, where we find photos of funeral decorative statues mixed with placid sunsets and rarefied landscapes, the album title written in Italian and German.
The listening experience refers to the same atmospheres, and the first track, "Ascension" with the composed voice of Emilia Loiacono dancing on the Strings, constitutes an ideal overture.
Let's immediately say that the musical directions of this album are fundamentally two. Ethereal folk and obsessive Techno-Goth.
"I Am the Light" definitely belongs to the second definition, here Angelo's deeply filtered voice rests on an electronic groove and the synthesizer carpets that seem to homogenize everything (also because they are found in almost all tracks) contributing to creating a unique sound.
"Kaalk", among my favorite Kirlian tracks, is characterized by a flanged loop and other classic sounds of digital and non-digital synthesis. Suddenly, the kick drum doubles, incomprehensible voices rise from the darkness, an instrumental track that alone is worth the purchase of the whole album, the only downside is the synthetic sax solo that becomes long and baroque. A brief symphonic interlude leads us to "Wasted Bridge", a moving ballad dominated by Emilia's disorienting voice.
Track 9 "Ussr 1972" is an interesting experiment in sound design that confirms Bergamini's taste and skill with his machines.
From here on, the sound is all industrial, culminating in the EBM surge of "Meine Nachte..."
Pictures from Eternity is not an album for everyone. Its listening is recommended for lovers of Dark-Wave and the slower, more industrial gothic who can literally travel through these 14 tracks dated 1996.
In the years to come, excluding a small surge towards the end of the nineties, Kirlian Camera will remain a cult band for the few.
However, between line-up changes and inevitable personal events, theirs seems to be a legend that to this day has never completely faded.
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
01 Ascension (05:25)
Along these gardens the breeze of May
is drifting in the light
And all the pictures are holy and lost
are burning in the sky.
We're on the border, on the wet edge
the sparkling of the cross
and I see your eyes so far from here
flying in the purple dust.
Spring is all around you
and calls your name softly in the wind
Burning when the day is dying
she kills the rays of a boundless sun.
And falls after years of death
eternally on your tears of joy.
So feel, feel the hands of glory
that will lead you into a golden sea.
I see the angels, they come from there,
they've crossed the flaming curtain.
Your glance is nervous but there's no fear
you're waiting for your crown.
Spring is all around you
and calls your name softly in the wind
And falls after years of death
eternally on your tears of joy.
Starless is the evening door
I see your face, your face in the sun
and shine in this endless spring
forever in the light.
Burning when the day is dying
and kills the rays of a boundless sun.
So feel, feel the hands of glory
that will lead you in a golden sea.
And shine in this endless spring
forever in the light.
And shine in this endless spring
forever in the light.
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