Golgatha * Tales Of Transgression And Sacrifice (cd 2007 cold meat industry)
I didn’t really know this band when I saw them at last year’s Wave Gotik Treffen in Leipzig. They sounded to me like a rather typical new band from the scene, mixing different styles (neofolk, industrial, martial, orchestral). The show wasn’t too great and I never really tried to get their music. Also I didn’t know that this band was signed on CMI. This is no longer really a guarantee that a release is good, but I have to admit that it does still is an argument for me to try an album. So I skipped the first four releases and got myself “Tales Of Transgression And Sacrifice”. The album opens with ambient, continues with neofolk, ritualistic industrial and atmospheric music. It is not bad at all, but it seems to not ‘work’ for me. Maybe I have to get used to the style, but the harder tracks sound quite nice already, they remember a little of Parca Pace. I think I have to play the album a few times more, at the moment my conclusion is: good try, not bad, not great.
Links: :Golgatha:, Cold Meat Industry
-2.5-
I obviously missed most releases of this French industrial project. I only had the “Forever War” cd from 1999. I don’t like that cd too much, so that may be the reason, just like the fact that this new (but not latest!) album has been released by CMI was a reason to give “Septentrion” a change. Of course there is a big gap between the two albums that I now have and I have no idea how D&DE developed in this period, but “Septentrion” sounds quite different from the martial dark ambient album that I already had. This new cd is much more martial, much more industrial, much darker and in most tracks, also better. Some tracks have singing, others have a nice industrial sound, but there still are parts that remind a bit too much of the monotous sound of ‘that other album’. There are five tracks making a 44 minute album, which is not very long. In total, “Septentrion” is not at all a bad album, but also not a masterpiece.
However Cold Meat has contributed to the “martial scene” with bands such as Sophia, Karjalan Sissit and Rome, I had not expected a ‘real martial industrial’ album on this label, especially not from a Balkan project. The first release of Sturmast opens with two very typical martial industrial tracks that remind of Wappenbund, but fortunately they prove to have musical ideas of their own as well. With the also typical use of looped (folky) samples Sturmast manages to create some very nice tracks. “Kraft” (3) starts nice, but lacks variation, but “The Big Play” (4) is a nice track with a guitar sample and subtle orchestrations and “For Everyone Circus And Bread” (5) really lives up to the title, very amusing! After this, two quite typical martial industrial tracks close the 35 minute album. Not great, not always too original, but overall an agreeable album that you can buy if you want to keep your “martial” collection complete.
I am afraid that Stormfågel is one of those new projects that make me conclude that not every new CMI release is a ‘must buy’. In 2005 the band released their first cd on CMI (after a release by themselves) called “Den Nalkende Stormen”. This is a rather boring atmospheric album with singing and appears to use folk music melodies here and there. A couple of months ago the new album saw the light of day. “Ett Berg Av Fasa” is better than “Den Nalkende Stormen” but far from a masterpiece. It seems that some real instruments have been added to the sound and also more folky melodies, samples and orchestrations. Unfortunately the improvement is only marginal. Tracks 3 and 4 are quite nice, but the awfull track from the “All My Dead Friends” compilation (the only track that I skip when playing this compilation) is on the new album too (6) and the rest doesn’t really rise above a level of dullness. Let us just say that the music of Stormfågel is not my taste.
Hm, is the new Coph Nia a new album? “A celestrial tragedy in two acts”, the cover says. The first act is a 15 minute dark ambient soundscape that is not too appealing, but just when things get going (noisy), it suddenly ends (after the title “The end” perhaps). Then we mostly get a collection of covers and new versions of old songs, starting with “The new oath”, then comes “Fire” (“I am the god of hellfire, and I bring you; fire”, just like The Prodigy), “Sympathy For The Devil (Rolling Stones, earlier covered by Laibach), “Drinking to the angel of the east”, which sounds awfully familiar, “Religion”, a Front 242 that he also plays live. Two tracks that I didn’t mention yet are “Credo V” and “Hymn to Lucifer”. The album doesn’t convince me at all, just separate tracks of a not too high quality. Too bad, because the previous works are very good.
Rome from Luxembourg has delighted us with a magnificent mcd and a brilliant full-length and only months later there is a new album, again on CMI. I hope this tempo will not continue and lead to overkill. “Confessions” is again a masterpiece. It is slightly different in style, but still ‘very much Rome’. The bombastic and orchestral opener may appeal to the lovers of the popular martial industrial style, but again the cd is very tranquil and melancholic. Just on a few occasions you will get something more industrial. Actually, this new cd is more tranquil with accoustic guitar and singing than on the previous releases. Besides this you will hear ambient, wave-like sounds, industrial, orchestrations and here and there a martial tone (especially in the background samples). Rome as a concept is carefully put together with a great ear and eye for details. The music is multi-layered with a lot of things happening on the background. This care also shows during live-performances where a beautiful film is projected on the background which goes perfectly with the songs and the lyrics. If you like the previous releases, you will also like “Confessions”. As a personal note I have to add that the previous releases (which I have put on one disc and always play as one thing) have more songs that really give me gooseflesh and work on my emotion, so in this regard “Confessions” may be a little less good than “Berlin” and “Nera”. Maybe this is because the novelty is gone, I cannot tell. In any case, do not expect popular martial and orchestral industrial, but a very personal, intimate and melancholic release with brilliantly built-up songs. 
Long ago CMI was a progressive label with all kinds of exciting music. This developed into ‘the CMI-style’ and however the label never really had one sound, my interest deminished a bit. Then CMI started to meddle a bit with already popular kinds of music, such as neofolk. Now it seems that Roger Karmanik is trying to get back to being (one of) the better labels from the scene. I adore Rome and in Pimentola from Finland, CMI has found a highly original and high-quality project with a very progressive release. It is almost impossible to describe Pimentola. The music goes from weird horror sounds with screamed and distorted vocals, to orchestral and bombastic industrial, from ‘jazz-ambient’ to almost Novy Svet-like passages. This album had to grow on my, but I love it.