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Review Summary: A genuinely good effort. Every field is different; within the film music community, you side on either the more old-school style of filmscores a la John Williams (Star Wars, Schindler's List, Indiana Jones) or the more modern genre of bombastic and electronica influenced music by Hans Zimmer (The Rock, Gladiator, Pirates of the Caribbean). And then you stick to it. No matter what.
With metal it's different. Since the beginning of this millenium it seems more than ever that it has become remarkably tough for turned-commercially-succesful metal bands to maintain any respect whatsoever from people within the community. People who many times used to adore them. Reviewers, fans and supporters of extreme music have in that way - perhaps ironically - turned out to be the most conservative ones. Whereas this might be nowhere else as true as with Swedish Gothenburg metal act In Flames (which could without shame start printing new merchandise stating "Bashing since 2002" following their release "Reroute to Remain" in the same year), Norwegian neighbours and symphonic black metalers Dimmu Borgir are also a part of similar unmerciful targeting. Once generally considered a more or less "true" black metal band, ever since the previous release "Death Cult Armageddon" (2003), Dimmu Borgir have been seen as headed off on a more commercial, and per definition outlawish, route.
So how does one go on to review a release by a band that large parts of the community seem to despise, but that is at the same time one of the leading bands within the genre to date? Well, it demands further technical analyzation of the music itself. Something widely lacking in music journalism today.
"In Sorte Diaboli" is a good effort. It really is. For the first time in the band's history, "In Sorte Diablo" is built up as a concept album. It tells the story of a priest who, in medieval Europe, turns his back on Christianity to instead turn over to the dark side. From a songwriter's point of view this type of writing method should deliver quite an interesting framework (lyrically, but possibly even musically). Sadly, it doesn't really show in the end prduct. It must be concluded that unless you were told that this is a concept album, you probably wouldn't figure that out yourself by the first or even second listening. But most of us could probably live with the fact that Dimmu Borgir doesn't deliver a perfectly structured opera here. The song-writing feels both polished and thourough with genuinely rhythmized riffs ("The Chosen Legacy") and well written melodies. The music, as so often within the genre, is more or less centered around the typically "evil" intervals of the minor 2nd and the diminished 5th. This take shape in its most obvious way already in opener "The Serpentine Offering" which delivers an almost stereotypical riff alternating only between these two intervals. It's simple and heavy and almost a little ridiculous and quite nice at the same time. The same song also shows off Dimmu Borgir's more symphonic side with an all orchestra and choir intro. Sadly, these are all sampled. Given the remarkable result of the cooperation with Norwegian composer Gaute Stooras and the Norwegian Radio Orchestra on follow-up "Abrahadabra", it seems a shame that something similar could not be applied already on this album, which is showing potential for a lot more of this kind.
Shagraths growls serve the music (if still by no means in themselves very impressive). The spoken vocals have to me always seemed quite superfluos (possibly with the exception of how they were used on 2001 song "Puritania" where they served a more industrial soundscape), but are, if they were ever really inspiring to anyone, at least not any worse than before. The lyrics follow the theme of the concept story: "For I cannot enslave myself / With imaginary words of salvation / The hypocrisy that surrounds my temple / Is assisted by pretenders to the throne".
Absolute highlight of "In Sorte Diaboli" is the bridge in "The Invaluable Darkness". Over a simple, almost pop-like chord progression (of Cm - Gm - Eb - Bb) and blast-beats, bass player ICS vortex sings a high-pitched melancholic melody that seem to cut to the core of Scandinavian inherent sadness (if there is such a thing). Along with single "Sacrilegious Scorn" it stands out as the best song on an album that is to be considered a genuinely good effort from the eyes of someone who couldn't really care less about what was once Dimmu Borgir.
EDIT: It seems that many people feel upset about the point I put forward about a certain demand for technical analyzation of music within musical reviews. I would like to say a few things about this to clarify.
First of all, I never suggested a music review should be a dissection of a piece of music in theoretical terms. Whereas that might be very interesting to some, it might be too much of an elitist standpoint for the general reader. However, it is clear that music journalism today - generally - has a tendency of emphasizing an artist's or band's image more than the actual music (one example would be Lady Gaga). And once the music itself is being discussed, it often ends up being a judgment based on no arguments or arguments that are shallow at best. Whereas some might find this type of arguing satisfying (and indeed many seem to, given the many angry comments), I don't think it is. And especially when it comes to the metal genre where reviews can be based entirely on an opinion that "something is bad because it doesn't sound like it used to", I do think that you will, in some way or another, have to be able to really point to certain aspects of the music in your arguing if you want to be taken seriously. And that will very likely require some kind of more technical analyzation.
I do suspect the many strong reactions could be linked to an actual insight of the shortcoming of many reviewers' understanding of music.
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Album Rating: 2.5
Well, it demands further technical analyzation of the music itself. Something widely lacking in music journalism today.
Probably the worst line I've eve read in a review before. If anything, music journalism is more critical than ever these days.
| | | Album Rating: 3.0
@TheSpirit: Quite at contrary, by putting it like you do, you're making a fool of yourself. Any person with an insight into and understanding of music and journalism will know that the latter is - at large -, lacking any remotely detailed analyzation of the music in technical terms. If you want to prove me wrong, you can always try to find me a Lady Gaga review that mentions the fusion of her chord progressions with certain phrasing of melodies and how this can be understood in a wider psychological perspective in the succes of the concept. I mean yes, it might be "intellectual" snobbery on my behalf, but that has never been a sin in this type of forum, has it?
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"genuinly"
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Quite at contrary, by putting it like you do, you're making a fool of yourself. Any person with an insight into and understanding of music and journalism will know that the latter is - at large -, lacking any remotely detailed analyzation of the music in technical terms. If you want to prove me wrong, you can always try to find me a Lady Gaga review that mentions the fusion of her chord progressions with certain phrasing of melodies and how this can be understood in a wider psychological perspective in the succes of the concept. I mean yes, it might be "intellectual" snobbery on my behalf, but that has never been a sin in this type of forum, has it?
How many people do you think want to know what scale was used here, or what key tone the bridge of the 5th song is?
None, that's not what a musical review is about. Not to mention most people reading probably don't know what that information is, much less care. All a musical review is really there for is to outline the pros and cons of a piece and give a good indication of what the music sounds like and whether it's worth acquiring or not.
Whether or not the musician syncopates the rhythm in the second breakdown of the second song doesn't mean two shits when trying to decide whether to buy the album or not
But hey, if you want to go all music theory on Lady Gaga, be my guest. I'm sure no one will care.
| | | Album Rating: 2.5
Basically what Hyperion said; when I'm saying their critical I'm not referring to how in depth they get when describing the music. Look around you-- Sputnik, Pitchfork, Review Rinse Repeat are all sites dedicated to music criticism, not to mention the thousand other lesser known sites as well as peoples personal blogs who all do the same. Places like this are were people gather together and all they do is talk music. Music criticism as at an all time high; perhaps not in the take by take aspect you are referring to, but in an overall sense, yes.
| | | Album Rating: 3.0
@TheSpirit:
As a matter of fact, I would claim that what I have read on Sputnik this far has been fairly impressive (not at least a review of the new Linkin Park album by one of the staff which I thought was very well executed with many parallells to specific elements within other acts). But these pages are by no means reflective of the wider music journalistic scope, and personal blogs wouldn't even fall under that category in the first place.
@Hyperion1001:
We could certainly argue what a musical review is about. Ultimately, it is a question of which level you want to put it at. Most major newspapers and magazines will review Lady Gaga's new album based on her twittering activities and latest haircut (to put it in a slightly but still not all-too-exaggerated way). But by claiming that "[a]ll a musical review is really there for is to outline the pros and cons of a piece and give a good indication of what the music sounds like...", you already give away the core question. What makes good music? And what makes it bad? The intro part of my review was not only for the sake of entertaining the reader; it was to point out an almost inescapable problem that faces not at least the readers of musical reviews. In many cases reviewers seem to rely only (and that would include some reviews even here on Sputnik) on a subjective perception of how terribly bad a band has gone because it doesn't play the music the reviewer wants it to play anymore.
And it is when you end up at that point that you have to deepen the conversation and be able to point out what you're actually arguing for. Otherwise it would be like discussing literature while being illiterate. The language is necessary, the facts are necessary, no matter how boring. The task of the reviewer will be to make them understandable to the reader.
I'm sorry for making this a subject of a dissertation here, but you seem to demand that I explain myself.
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What makes music good or bad is subjective, a review's purpose is to elaborate on the reasons why you think something is poorly done or excellent. However you do it, as long as it's well-written, is usually fine by me. I mean, you'll see tons of progheads jumping for joy because that 23+2/16+8 bridge in the fourth song of album X is so exciting in its unconventionality. Other users are more influenced by the emotions felt while listening to an albums. Others are more lyrically-focused and some are usually looking for a fun ride, bottom line. Therefore, saying that one form of critiquing music is better than another is pretty stupid because of how large the realm of criticism is. And trust me, there are plenty of reviews that are extremely specific and scathing, while there are others which are so detailed with claims of how amazing the album is that it eventually becomes clear that one way of reviewing is not always better than another. Usually it's all dependent on context. For a Dimmu Borgir album I'd never talk about chord progressions unless they were really that outstanding(ly bad). That's mostly because Dimmu Borgir are focused more so on dramatics and atmospherics than musical prowess. Lady Gaga is more concerned about lyrics and catchiness than being experimental, so saying it's bad only because it's "pop music" is also pretty out of context. You just have to realize which forms of presenting your arguments will be the most effective for a reader to understand the album and to understand your points, because, at the end of the day, most people are usually searching for advice as to "what music's out there and is it good?" when they read a review. Based on your ethos they may disagree, but they should know whether they'll probably agree or not and why.
| | | Album Rating: 3.0
@Bitchfork:
I welcome that as the first sensible comment by anyone reading this review so far. We largely seem to agree. As for mentioning chord progressions in a Dimmu Borgir review I will openly admit that it is by no means conventional. However, it does seem unavoidable to me at this point to at least get down to viewing the actual language of a record that so many have critiqued on what seems (unusually) badly underbuilt grounds. Although I'm not saying that my analyzation is in any way the most elaborate ever made (this is my first review ever, on top of that in a foreign language, I might add).
As for Lady Gaga, I'd say lyrics and catchiness together make out about 50-75% of a much bigger concept that noone seems to even have begun to discuss yet. It can be traced to a type of "glamorous melancholy" that is being expressed not at least in terms of choice of chord progressions, melody phrasing, vocal expression and overall production. But then again, cracking the code of the most economically succesful pop artist at the moment... No one would claim that to be a piece of cake, I guess.
EDIT: I still might add that I think you might have missed my main point, depending on how directed your comment was towards what I had already pointed out (or simply towards the discussion in general). My argument of reviewing the "musical language" was never about the type of proghead musician-fascism in the style of giving something credit because of it's complexity. It is very clear to me that Dimmu Borgir's music is in fact largely based on atmosphere etc. I simply wanted to make the point that if you do discredit a certain type of music because it no longer sounds like it once did, you better be able to at least point out - in some way technically - what that is all about. That is if you want your opinion to be taken seriously. Within no other field would you be if you could not bring forth any argument (but apparently that was an opinion a bit too strong for a majority of people commmenting).
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lol comments
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this whole thread tl;dr and its only the first page
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yeah, too many characters to compute
| | | Album Rating: 2.5
bailar why are younot fun anymore
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paragraph after paragraph...
| | | Album Rating: 1.5
Hyperion1001 hit the nail on the head
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I wish the whole album was as good as the first song.
| | | Album Rating: 2.0
I be reading Anton Lavavey's Satanic bible right now, dat be some evil shit right thur.
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I'd imagine so.
| | | Album Rating: 2.0
It's strange, well not really in how much I agree with most of the shit i've read in there so far.
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Haha.
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I just remembered I bought this painting, and the artist wrote stuff on the back from that book in Latin. I sent him a message like "That is some kvlt shit!"
http://www.etsy.com/transaction/11490861
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