Am Ende… is probably the single most frustrating album I have ever listened to, yet I simply cannot stop it from spinning in my cd player nearly every day. On the one hand, we have the actual black metal side of Austrian avant-garde/melodic/ambient black metal band Mondstille, which is comprised of your fairly standard black metal: a small handful of riffs repeated over and over again behind the same old blast beats you’ve heard a million times from other, more noteworthy bands. However, the b-side of
Am Ende…, the part which the black metal didn’t let you in on, was the fantastically atmospheric, melodic, and emotional acoustic barrage this album simply unloads on you. Think the likes of October Falls circa
Marras, and add a slightly more melancholic atmosphere and what you get is something like the side of Mondstille which really sets them apart from the ten thousand other bands who play something along the same genre lines as these fine fellows do.
It’s frustrating that, when listening to the first seven tracks of the album, which comprise the black metal portion of the release, that the sheer potential of these crafty musicians simply doesn’t want to come to the forefront and blow you away. Instead, we are left with large portions of uninspired, boring black metal filled with all-too-similar riffing patters, your run-of-the-mill vocals, and drumming which is flat out unimpressive. It’s hard to get through the first half of the album without surrendering to your will to go listen to some Burzum or Ulver to keep you interested. However, there are hints at something greater than what you are hearing, something which I think this band is remarkably efficient at.
That something is writing some absolutely astounding classical guitar pieces which are straight-up quality. The atmosphere runs thick through each piece, and the entire last half of the album (the final seven songs) are devoted to nothing but this aspect of the band. It is these seven songs where the album picks up, and never really lets back down. There are songs where a beautiful melody is created out of a complex piece of music (see the standout track “Frei” for a perfect example of what I’m talking about). These beautiful acoustic sections also work their way into the black metal portion of the album, appearing numerous times to add another aspect to the painfully one-dimensional black metal affair. It’s sad because if Mondstille managed to get their electric guitar riffs up to the same sort of quality and technicality of the acoustic and classical guitars then they would really be on to something, because the final seven songs are some of the finest ambient/acoustic tracks I have ever come across.
By the time everything is said and done, I can no doubt tell that you will be frustrated by what this album could have been. It could have been a mix of
Kveldssanger and
Under A Funeral Moon, however in the end it ends up only being up to par for one of the two main aspects of the music. It is by no means a terrible album, the musicianship is far too good to allow for that,
Am Ende... is simply an album which could have been so much more, but will now most likely fade away without anyone even noticing it, because those who choose to listen to it will be gone before the good parts of the album ever appear. A sad case, indeed, but one which we may hear about in the future as a band to give October Falls a run for their money at their own game.
