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Rating:
The other day I was traveling, the journey was long, and consequently the evening as well. Usually, when I travel, I really enjoy listening to a good album or taking advantage of the time to discover new ones.
Some time ago, I had started listening to this "Nighttime Birds", and although it struck me from the first moment, I hadn't been able to delve into it due to lack of time, so the other night I thought it was a good idea to use it as my travel companion. The trip was wonderful. As the landscapes swiftly passed by the train window, appreciable and fascinating even though it was already almost dark with the onset of sunset, I was accompanied by the splendid notes of this album.
A follow-up to the famous "Mandilyon", it possesses the same characteristics of gothic rock/metal, but with a more psychedelic vein that makes it very introspective and atmospheric. In short, the perfect accompaniment to the situation I was experiencing at that moment, absorbed in my thoughts, observing the beauty of nature as the day was drawing to a close, with only the desire to reach my destination soon eased by the sounds reaching my ears.
The songs are all measured and melodic, where Anneke's wonderful voice immediately strikes you with its expressiveness and sweetness, supporting melodies that are never trivial, exploding in the choruses, where the distorted guitars (but perfectly measured) know how to add the rest.
An album where it's really hard to find faults: there are none. Everything is skillfully measured, arranged and well-recorded, from the atmospheres created with the keyboards, to the slow and hypnotic rhythm of the drumming, to the guitar arpeggios. But the voice, the voice is a rare and unique beauty that immediately breaks through. Let's be precise, it's not the vocal prowess that hits you (though excellent), it's not the vocal technique that amazes you, but it's precisely its captivating timbre.
I could mention the most beautiful songs, such as the title track, the opener "On Most Surface", "The May Song", or the last "Shrink" made only of voice and piano, but it's better if I stop, because given the intrinsic charm in each of them, I would risk listing them all. In general, the overall sound of the work and the atmosphere created song after song are among the most beautiful you can imagine for this genre: a pearl in the musical landscape of refined and remarkable beauty.
Beauty, because in the end "Nighttime Birds" is this, no exaggerations, no unnecessary frills, just inspired musicians who have managed to draw from their ideas and creativity simply a work of Art (with a capital A).
I recommend it to everyone indiscriminately, if you love things done well, you cannot abstain from listening to this masterpiece.
P.S. Thanks to Fidia for recommending this album to me.
Tracklist Lyrics and Samples
01 On Most Surfaces (Inuït) (06:54)
The frost hits me in the eye
And wakes me
These are blury winters
And I cannot see
I walk into the white light of the snow
When the sun comes
I break it with my shadow
Which tales me where I go
The frost hits me in the eye
And wakes me
I am the snow falling down on you
I tear up your face with my frost
And make you run to somewhere warm
When I come I see you get away
I brust out about your emptyness
The frost hits me in the eye
And wakes me
These are blury winters
02 Confusion (06:33)
False eyes are staring
disrespectfully and untrue
The burden that we are carrying
is way too much for me and you
Sometimes it is better to lay
Don't you think?
I'm evaporating
A veil of smoke is what I am
Your thoughts will take on their way
To grow old and to be certain
03 The May Song (03:44)
I'm waiting for your hands
to fold around my wrist
I'm mellowing in warm grass
and the scent of you I've missed
And blue is representing
the draft in my heart
I'm wandering through thin skies
and the transparent air I've missed
Pale is my face
you might want to colour
while I breathe
I'm following large drops of rain
with my eyes on the sight of you I've missed
Pale is my face
you might want to colour
while I breathe
04 The Earth Is My Witness (05:31)
Mother earth look at her closely
she looks at her baby and she sighs
the slight breathing pause that she takes it builds her and
makes her strong
She refuses to give her up
and we close our eyes
Her hands touch the round stomach
and feel the kick
The eyes that have seen so much cry
with the water she starts to rinse her face
And refuses to give her up
And we close our eyes
And you close your eyes
05 New Moon, Different Day (06:06)
I'm at the waterside
my cold feet are numb
and I follow my dream
I want to cross
I want to get inside
The clouds make a circle
on the soil that I'm on
and I trust what surrounds me
I want to cross
I break the storm through the clouds
I'm on the other side
I watch time pass
and I see, I have to go along
with the water that will lead the way
and I feel, the rain on my head
and the drops hit me one by one
I break the storm through the clouds
06 Third Chance (05:25)
Fear and sweat, my muscles ache.
I smile, but it's just a fake.
I fade away.
It troubles me, what you're gonna say:
Just a day away,
And you will be here to stay.
I wait and I wait,
And what I really hate
Is the panic that stops me from breathing.
My knees hit the floor
And I panic more,
Until you open my door.
This whole world could explode around us.
Will they ever know
We had a third chance?
I wait and I wait,
And what I really hate
Is the panic that stops me from breathing.
My knees hit the floor
And I panic more,
Until you open my door.
08 Nighttime Birds (07:02)
Their ways are open
they spread as their wings
they want to be certain
of a warm surrounding
When they fly
through the night as beautiful
nighttime birds
The warm wind picks them up
When they fly
through the night as beautiful
nighttime birds
09 Shrink (04:01)
To feel this great urge
To hold and embrace you
I slowly dry out
I shrink and shrink
Until I'm gone
Nothing to make out of me
Oh what the hell went wrong
My heart gets pulled out
Into your direction
It's no use
You have forsaken me
10 Strange Machines (06:50)
it has always been in the back of my mind
dreaming about going to the corners of time
i always wanted to fly in strange machines
i wanna do centuries in a lifetime
and feel it with my hands
touch the world war II and Cleopatra
flying...
could it be that my dream would come true
building a machine that would actually do
what i want it to do
russian revolution, let's do that in one day
Beethoven and Gershwin i think that would be o.k.
more than anything i wanna fly in strange machines
i wanna do centuries in a lifetime
and see it with my eyes
watch Jesus rise, if he ever did
flying...
i wanna do centuries in a lifetime
and feel it with my hands
touch renaissance and Chaka Khan
flying...
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Other reviews
By fede
Anneke welcomes the listener with her wonderful trills, a pure and angelic hand that seems to drag you out of a fiery magma in which you sink.
The title track is absolutely the most atmospheric piece, sweetly melancholic, wintery, and icy present on the album.
