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Rating: "At sixes and sevens", undeniably, would never have been an undisputed masterpiece, even if "Widow's Weed", "Beyond the Veil", and "World of Glass" by Tristania had never existed. While several bands have shown us that originality is not an essential element to write good music, this lacks the poignant melancholy that must necessarily frame a gothic album: in this grandiose overlap of different musical elements, where electronics often dominate, the whole often suffers from a lack of impact.
Here there's a piano, but it doesn't sketch images of ancient landscapes in the listener's mind; there's the same romantic violin by Pete Johansen, but it fails to reach high emotional peaks; there are no poetic whispers from Vibeke Stene's angelic voice (guest vocalist Fabienne Gondamin's voice is certainly not one of the most expressive heard in a metal group, it's closer to pop than operatic tones and yet appears relatively little). The rest of the instruments build rhythms that are practically identical to those of Tristania's "Beyond the Veil". The song structure is trivial, and the compositional stagnation, in almost all tracks on the album, is only interrupted by the arrival of magnificent Gregorian chants (the only element that truly represents anything gothic here), which however do not uplift the album's overall fate. Certainly, chills down the spine occur listening to the notes of "Meridian", "Sister Nightfall", "On the Wane", and "At Sixes and Sevens" (masterpieces, impactful and evocative in their dark and dreamlike progression), and this is no small feat, but after hearing a copy of the same song for most of the album's duration, it's impossible not to get tired (moreover, from the third track, electronics become more insistent and, after that, the tones drop sharply and never rise again; only a few flashes here and there are saved).
A separate matter for the final track, "In Sumerian Haze", which seems to want to approach the world of electronic pop and dark music. Unfortunately, even in this case, nothing transcendental. Fortunately, the lyrics have retained that typical brilliance of Veland's style (something that Tristania, however, have lost).
Overall, the imaginary proposed here is something futuristic and apocalyptic, a kind of distant underwater world (emphasized by the aqua green tones of the booklet), which, for me, a lover of all forms of art that can be defined as gothic (including literature), seems slightly out of place. So, if, for example, with their dark theatricality, the early albums by Theatre of Tragedy, the vampiric airs of "Cruelty and the Beast" by Cradle of Filth, the funereal elegies of "Widow's Weeds" by the fantastic Tristania could be compared for their intense emotionality to gothic-romantic poems or novels, Sirenia's debut only approaches them from a distance.
The dark and dramatic emotions that the band leader once knew how to deliver with his songs have (unfortunately) been locked away, and who knows if Sirenia will ever manage to open that drawer in the future. Certainly, within the limits of gothic metal, which has accustomed us to much worse things, Sirenia will also be able to write good songs, but to be able to consider them as something indispensable, one truly needs to settle for little and regard music not as a deep emotional experience but as a pastime to fill gaps in a day. Nonetheless, faced with episodes like the first tracks of the album, the hope that the group might reserve surprises in the future will be slow to die.
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
01 Meridian (06:20)
Daylight adorn her withering lifeforce
with a long lost river
that mend all her woe in it's flow
May i redeem my funeral self
in thy mirror of soul sanctorum
to frame every night a delight
Thou stalk the ground, the sea and the winds around
to haunt me down profound when the night surrounds
Thou stalk the Stygian stream and the riverine
to haunt my hallowed fields and astrayel dreams
I'm at sixes and sevens
in the shade of my heavens
No moon, nor sun
Meridian
prevail in my oblivion
Come with me to seek the sun inside
Meridian
This time around we dance
We're chosen ones
Thou stalk as the unseen in visions undreamed
to revel in the deep of life's malignity
Thou stalk my manic mind yon it's horizon
to draw that waning sun upon Meridian
Thou art eternal darkness
Thou art eternal heresy
Thou art day and night
Thou art the flame inside
I'll make my misery thy saturnine
02 Sister Nightfall (05:38)
Child every time you come around
You divert my feelings, and bring me further down
Would you like to be the serpentine whirls of the stream?
Would you like to cope for all your dreams?
Sister Nightfall controlling the lights in me
Though it hurts it feels just like a dream
Come down to linger in heresy
And come down on me with all your serenity
Shivers down the spine
When she comes down the hall
Thy effigy seems frail to be
Or was it ever there at all?
Child every tear that runs adown
Will merge and hurt now that winter's all around
Would you like to wear the secrets of the seven seas?
Would you like to be what you can't be?
Sister Nightfall controlling the lights in me
Though it hurts it feels just like a dream
Come down to linger in the undreamed
And come down on me to cope for what should have been
Give in on tonight
All heavens on their fall
We failed to find that soul divine
Enshrined within us all
She sets her sails for another sea
There's more to life than your eyes reveal
Upon its scenery...
Sister Nightfall controlling the lights in me
Though it hurts it feels just like a dream
Sister I call out in vain for thee
Though I hurt you, won't you set me free?
04 In a Manica (06:03)
How can you stand there
like a weakening fire
awaiting the final end?
If you consider
still hanging in there
You will wither
in each and in every way
How can you stand it?
Say can you mend it?
Don't you pretend that
the world is a better place?
If you're in denial
life is worth while
You can rely on
there's comfort in exit ways
In a manica the reaper comes around
And the winds they sweep my manic funereal ground
Some deranged and some devour
to haunt me down in my darkest hour
Yet another mind of the Devil's design
When we gather our frail souls beyond our persistence
When we cope for our lives with fantasy
When we cover our eyes and mourn our loss of existence
When we falter, deprived and out of dreams
Do you see there are times?
to read in the lines?
And trust me you will find
the things that you know
will hurt you so
You can't deny that anymore
06 Lethargica (05:30)
Lethargic sleepers they close their eyes
Diverted dreamers unfolding their lives
Sleep now sister enfold your fall
You can't take the exile anymore
And like all the others, you're lost tonight
Would you dance entranced in waning fields
and to falter on through life's mortality?
Would you veil your woebegone eyes
to conceal these wounds that I consider mine?
Wither like in autumn
waning yon the veil
You concede the pain is nonpareil
Wither like in your life
waning like your days
I concede your pain is nonpareil
Lethargic sleeper - devote your life
Diverted dreamer - give in on tonight
Wake now sister for times to come
In a run towards the pantheon
And like all the others, you're lost in life
Would you swirl your world into a sea?
far beyond the hurt of life's malignity
Would you cope for the loss in your life?
and to cede the night that sets within your eyes
Cover your eyes to mend the hurt inside
You wither in life like autumn leaves
Infidel divine, you are the reason why I choose this way
to cease my life, you are the treason in us all
08 A Shadow of Your Own Self (05:58)
Tell me now you sinner
you run for a better world
Tell me why you'd leave her
despite all the hurt
Don't deny that you once tried to mend
the circumstances now out of hand
And don't deny your life's a living hell
you're a shadow of your own self
Tell me now you sinner
still lost in your secret world
Tell me now you've seen her
you know how she hurts
Don't deny that you will understand
the circumstances of pain at hand
And don't assert that we will both survive
'cause I can't take more of life
Stretch your arms out for the fire
for another dark desire
In the fields you burn with loss again
as you dream your life away
Say: would you never walk away
on the break of a coming day
Would you end this line with me
Would you like to waste away what we've ever been?
Would you like to come along with me?
Would you like to lay to rest our insanity?
Would you like to cope for the unreal?
09 In Sumerian Haze (04:39)
In sumerian haze you search for another day
Guess another vail left you this way
Thoughts on a line where I leave it all behind
Nothing can mend the hurt inside
Sweetened horizons
dance away the pain tonight
Just like you and I
Profoundly deranged
you go through another day
I guess it was meant to be this way
Thoughts on a line won't recover your mind
You cut your veins, like I've cut mine
Sweetened horizons
dance away the pain tonight
Just like you and I
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By azucena1510
"'At Sixes And Sevens' is truly a beautiful CD that gives you so many emotions!"
"The violins are a must, sometimes duetting with the guitars and creating extraordinary pieces."
