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Review Summary: Maniacal British Neo-Noir Voices arose from the ashes of the eccentric, extreme metal titans Akercocke, and three of its former members have reclaimed center stage. The distinct antecedent of this record, 2013's From The Human Forest..., saw the band firmly planting their feet, finding themselves, and effectively laid the groundwork for their (far more) well-defined sophomore release. Icy, resonant, frantic tremolos, manic shrieks, eerie piano and acoustics, twisted, indulgent sexual tension (with occasional sultry female vocals), and the dizzying drum-work of the legendary David Gray all coalesced into intelligently constructed discord. Nearly a year later, this blueprint of macabre debauchery found new life, sublimated into the conceptually complex, compositionally ambitious, Postmodern Neo-Noir madness of England's ancient metropolis. Enter: London. Eloquently narrated by the unmistakable, smooth cadence of David Gray, the listener is guided along a suffocating, existentialist exploration of degeneracy, and the process of cosmopolitan dehumanization, experienced through the eyes of a disintegrating histrionic thespian -- and the target of his fixations -- a fallen harlot. Without further ado, welcome to London...
London
Voices steers us through evocative narrations, capturing the gritty and oppressive undercurrents of its' namesake -- with remarkably lucid attention to detail -- all the while pummeling the listener with violent, cacophonous force. Voices paints a nearly palpable portrait, enervating the listener in its dreary, urban hegemony.
''Dead London sighs dense anxiety out of black, Westminster lungs, full of sickness. A decomposing clamber infects his every puddle-grazed foot forward, while the population dreams, safely asleep...
...He travels by night, journeys without destination, in cold buses amidst cold patrons without features. He wonders if indeed they are anything like him, without identity or soul; bereft of purpose, condemned to exist in the small hours. Not real people at all, rats and maggots incapable of keeping the rhythm of humanity, sent alone to survive outside the hive. Distinct from the dealers, pimps, burglars and filth, at least they possess a crass purpose, fighting for urban survival amongst themselves; boldly contaminating Lambeth street corners under pestilential night skies, they retreat as dawn light bleeds through clouds, and the city stirs from slumber...''
"Dystopian", you say？Hardly. While London's Neo-Noir cinematic format, and bleak, subjective themes necessarily accentuates the depravity and destitution of its' locale, there is nothing wholly divorced from reality, or entirely imagined about London. In the band's own words, Voices is "The true sound of South London".
The Actor
From the cathartic, vulnerable opening chords (and our superb introduction to vocalist, Peter Benjamin) of the ominously titled Suicide Note, we're introduced to our tragic central figure: The Actor, an ostentatiously flamboyant, jealous megalomaniac. An existentially warped, emotionally tortured figure, The Actor's punishing self-consciousness is captured extensively, in unsettling, germane detail.
"If there were a remedy, a magical pill to stop him thinking all the time, then he would surely take it. If there were a way to silence the constant questioning of every action and reaction, the analysis of every decision, then he might find peace. There must be a way to erase every thought from the head, and to drift into an automatic routine bereft of the constant anxiety of deep thought. Indecision plagues his every move, renders him inert, immobile, passive. Unable to summon the courage to face London; locked away, for days..."
Ostensibly, The Actor, gradually driven mad (presumably desensitized through exposure to his overwhelming environment), has developed a unique psychosis, wherein the city itself has been mentally anthropomorphized, and his every action is evaluated as a deliberate recital -- the script, for which his self-congratulatory mind is always certain to remain two steps ahead of -- for a disembodied, perceived audience. Cripplingly self-aware, he undergoes seemingly self-imposed trials, eventually being poisoned (imagined or otherwise), as his paranoid narcissism interprets his immediate surroundings as though they were eyes engrossed in his every move. His devotion to this performance is so complete that he allegedly abides the event.
"I'm not myself
I am the actor
Awaiting the cues
Unknown direction
From unknown directors
Actions that haunt
The invisible audience"
"...In the hospital light intensity of the café, he gasps bitter coffee, shifting heavily upon rancid furniture. Nobody speaks English here, and he submerges his identity in the anxious cadence of unsympathetic sounding discourse. With time, the ego slowly emerges, and desperation urges his rash exposure to the rancid night air; drinking breaths of sewer sod and smoke, scoring liquorice-black pollution onto the soul. He wretches, and watches the poison hit the sewer grill. Tremulous, he glimpses an artist sketching him from the café window, charcoal tip capturing his trauma on paper. Is this real？Is this happening？What must he look like to the artist, the observer？The reflection in the window surprises him, he scarcely recognizes himself. Why did they poison him？They left this detail out of the script, the director capturing his real reaction. He’s a professional, and delivers a professional performance; they can’t catch him out..."
Megan
The supporting role of this maniacal tale is the object of The Actor's obsessions - The Actress: Megan. A sexual profligate, and a plot device of hedonistic escapism, Megan is the pitiful simulacrum of an emotionally hollowed, debased woman.
"The emptiness kills
So she ***ed herself dry
And could no longer try
To feel anything inside
A black and white still
Of the actress at night
Captured in monochrome
For the theater wall
The mirror can not reflect
The beauty she expects...
...Diseased at the core
Unleashed, set free...
...I have no pride, I have no shame...
...When she became all that she became
There was nothing left to recognize"
Whether or not Megan exists independently of The Actor's deranged psyche is never entirely clear, and, frankly, is ultimately inconsequential. She is the one significant product of, or deterrent from the sheer schizoid solipsism of The Actor's unraveling mind.
"...He finds his way to the red light again, a beacon of sordid salvation, in the grey pestilence of rain and rubbish bins, where she is waiting, always waiting: Megan...
...For without her, he is without god...
...Yet when parted reduced to a nihilist..."
London is a superbly executed, intelligently designed (disturbing) confluence of demented phenomenology, (sexually) tense atmosphere, and voraciously sybaritic lyrical content. Deliberately oscillating between tempos and tones, London's composition reflects the madness of The Actor. Equally foreboding and manic, groovy yet discordant, and every bit as crushing as
it is vulnerable, London is an indelible balance of archetype and sound. From passionate, fragile croons to shrill, tortured howls, spoken-word characterizations atop inner-city ambiance, provocative (occasionally Flamenco) acoustics aligned to dissonant pianos, and the elaborate fills and blood-pumping blastbeats of one of metal's finest percussionists, London is a daring, inspired (bordering on avant-garde) achievement. Chaotic at first glance, Voices has carefully crafted an intricately arranged, vividly elucidated theater of the mind, rewarding the focus of repeated listens with it's numerous layers. Simply put, there is nothing else like London.
"He collects his thoughts on paper for the last time. He pauses, and slowly resigns himself to the perfection of silence. He longs to reject the notion of time and the methods of recording the space between actions. The idea of duration suddenly terrifies him, and he hides his clock in the wardrobe, pausing only to bring the clock face closer to his ear. He listens to the gentle insistence of it's clockwork heart for a brief moment, then it is hurriedly hidden from sight. Confident he will not be confined to the stifling rigidity of existing within minutes and seconds, but not confident enough to destroy the machine that displays and counts them. This inaction disgusts him. He feels like a ghost trapped in a living body waiting to expire, a specter in a grave of time. He returns to the table to complete the suicide note, wondering if it would be the last time he steps across the room. He has maneuvered across the wooden floorboards many times in his life, but only attaches any significance to this action now because it may never happen again..."
London will leave you sweating.
Recommendations
Megan
Hourglass
Last Train Victoria Line
Suicide Note
The Actress
The Antidote
Music For The Recently Bereaved
4.8/5
| other reviews of this album |
TheAkerstache (5)
A mirror into our soul, London is a perfect representation of the human condition....
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Album Rating: 4.5 | Sound Off
Forgive the obscene length. This is a complex concept-album, compounded with the fact that it has a high rating on the site, despite for 4 years having no reviews, I really wanted to try something distinct with this.
Please be sure to check out fellow user Akerstache's complimentary review when it comes out! We both coordinated writing two reviews accentuating different elements of the record - myself, the conceptual detail, and Akerstache You'll have to wait and see! So if it seems like I haven't 'described the album's music' enough, that was entirely deliberate. Cheers :D
Support the band, and check the album here: https://candlelightrecordsuk.bandcamp.com/album/london
Recommendations
Megan - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=22YfZwREN80
Hourglass - https://open.spotify.com/album/1Y3qpFwZZpisXPzhWxQANM
Last Train Victoria Line - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iv00d82bfZo
Suicide Note - https://candlelightrecordsuk.bandcamp.com/track/suicide-note
The Actress - https://candlelightrecordsuk.bandcamp.com/track/the-actress
The Antidote - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IvS10EJPbc8
Music For The Recently Bereaved https://candlelightrecordsuk.bandcamp.com/track/music-for-the-recently-bereaved
| | | Album Rating: 4.5 | Sound Off
Some post-script speculation: Given the Actor's neurotic, unhinged state, the "Artist" he describes allegedly sketching him at the end of The Antidote may very well have been killed by The Actor, as in the song that immediately follows we're met with the lyrics "This is the final portrait of The Artist". Given that there is another track with this exact name, if taken literally, he may have committed homicide.
Finally, the penultimate track, The Ultimate Narcissist (without even touching on the pathological characterization of the lyrics) appears to end quite aggressively, as the final lines "With obsession, he takes her hand. With desire, he encapsulates her." which precede a rather violent, final blastbeat. This is compounded by the fact that the actual final track on the album, Cold Harbour Lane -- itself a sinister, somewhat vague message -- is (lyrically) non-sequitur with the story of The Actor. The Actor simply ceases to be, it seems, which leads me to conclude he and Megan end in a murder-suicide scenario.
| | | Album Rating: 4.5 | Sound Off
Looking for any feedback on the formatting, grammar, etc. Also, what was some of Your favourite tracks?
Akerstache - What do Ya think? :D
| | | Album Rating: 5.0
Fan-fucking-tastic review! While I wouldn't normally condone as much adjective abuse as you utilize here, I think it works well to describe such an eccentric album!
I do have some other things I'd like to add to your analysis (and don't really want to focus on in my review), I think the actor and the narrator are the same person. Notice how everything is sung in the first person, up until The Ultimate Narcissist where the narrator sings for the first time, and it switches between two perspectives, both with the same goal of murdering Megan.
That also leads into Cold Harbor Lane, it's the actor and the narrator fleeing the crime scene. They've fully embraced their split personalities, referring to themselves as "we."
Imprisoned souls
Left to walk
Abandoned roads
In the dark
In this cold hearted world
Empty and betrayed
Welcome to cold harbour lane
Sometimes its hard to live
With the choices we have made
By shutting yourself away
Insincere and insane
Something calls your name
Don't disregard the devils game
This also leads to the possibility of the protagonist being a person who is infected by two personalities, the actor, and the narrator. I'm merely speculating here, but perhaps the poison was a suicide attempt.
Also, from a story telling perspective music for the recently bereaved is odd, it's almost like it's the events at the end of the story...
| | | Album Rating: 5.0
Wait, theory time. What if Suicide Note is the account of the murder. And the story isn't about him murdering Megan at all, at least, not like we thought. Music is him fleeing the crime scene, and the narration heralds the rest of the story. Vicarious Lover is him playing with her corpse, desecrating it, posing it for camera photos, acting out a false love he could never attain with her being alive. And then there's Megan.
I have no pride, I have no shame
Cold and lucid you are my dream
And I can not see my mistake.
I only see you
With Sketches he finds a new target, a new "Megan" (that or the repeat of "Megan" at the end of the song heralds his new obsession, whether her name is Megan or it's the name he gives his victim is unknown). The poison isn't an actual poison, but lust. It consumes him, he stalks her and begins hunting her. The Fucktrance is about his obsession reaching the point of dreaming about her, so lucidly he can "taste" her, as is Hourglass, a metaphor almost for how her time is running out. The House of Black Light isn't a brothel, but is instead his den, he is returning to prepare a place for her. The Final Portrait isn't his suicide note at all, but instead hers, he's been writing them to cover the murders. And using the events in Last Train he murders her in cold blood in Narcissist, he brings her to his chamber, "Cold Harbour Lane."
Probably not true at all, but hey, it crossed my mind lol.
My review will be up sometime next week, Monday most likely, as I'm working all weekend.
| | | Album Rating: 4.5 | Sound Off
Whooooooooaa :O
lmao this album potentially just became many times more creepy and dark. I imagine the band would raise an eyebrow at these speculations! The narrator never struck me as The Actor, but perhaps if viewed as a third-person metacognition then it could make sense. Can't wait for the review, lad!
| | | Album Rating: 5.0
Yeah lol, I just like speculating. Like how one time I created an entire theory that all the Opeth albums are interlocked and tell a story. It's fun.
Review will be up soon, I got a strong review to follow so I gotta make it good. :D
| | | Album Rating: 4.5 | Sound Off
Damn, that's an ambitious theory lol.
Can't wait to read it!
| | | Album Rating: 5.0
Haha, I'll never post it. It's completely inane, it made sense to me when I was young and wanted to believe Opeth were infallible super geniuses, but it's not true at all lol.
| | | Album Rating: 5.0
Review will be up tomorrow, been busy with college shit.
| | | Album Rating: 4.5 | Sound Off
No problem, mate. Lookin forward to it! :D
| | | Album Rating: 5.0
Finished! Gonna sleep on it and edit and upload it tomorrow!
| | | Album Rating: 4.5 | Sound Off
Ayyy, fuck yes! Can't wait! :D
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holy shit this level of music appreciation is so dope lmao, pos boys
| | | Album Rating: 4.5 | Sound Off
Many thanks, Ramon! I recall You were actually the first user that ever commented on a review of mine - a Fen review, over a year ago. I hope my writing has come along. :3
We make quite the team, Aker and I, I'd say. This (and its many hours of formatting and editing) was a joy to write.
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As I become the sorrow
the funeral of screams
| | | Album Rating: 4.0
I want to read this thread
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