Spend your plastic on this album!
Artiste: Plastic Violins of Darkness
Nationality: German
Album: Spiral
Year: 2015
Label: DHU Records
Genre: Doom
Tracks:
Anime in herba
Spiral
Solstice
Chronological position: Second album
Familiarity: Zero
Interesting factoid: Another one-man effort
Initial impression: Dark, atmospheric, powerful
Best track(s): Everything kind of runs together, and as there are only three tracks I wouldn't pick one, but none of them are bad and most are really good.
Worst track(s): See above
Comments: Three tracks, none of which are less than thirteen minutes, and one of which is twenty? It's either prog rock or doom metal. And it seems it's the latter. Although according to Metal Achives, it's “progressive doom/post-metal/space rock”. Hmm. Based out of Leipzig, Plastic Violins of Darkness (PVOD) is the brainchild of Marc-Andre Mahn, whom we don't even get a picture of. Ooh! Mysterious! As to the album, the first track is the longest, that twenty-minuter, and “Anime in herba” opens with a dark atmospheric growl, slow percussion and what could be synth though I can't tell as Herr Mahm is simply credited with “all instruments”. It's not as plodding as some of the Doom I've heard, though admittedly I haven't experienced that much, but as yet I don't get the feeling of claustrophobia about it that I've read another reviewer speak of. I'm not sure if there are vocals buried deep in the mix or if I'm just imagining that the instruments are speaking words?
Fairly spooky but nothing that's turning me off so far anyway, and we're a fifth of the way through the track.Certainly sounds like a vocoder but that could be just effects on the guitar I guess. I can see where the progressive tag comes from certainly. It's interesting how it kind of continues on the one basic melody all the way and yet doesn't seem to drag at all. Maybe good music to be depressed to? Kind of an idea of whalesong or something there at the end, and then it flows directly into the next track, which is the title (and penultimate) one.
More bass evident here and a lot of feedback, either voices or some sort of audio recording going on and yes, I do get the feeling of being in a spiral, so well done that man. Heavier guitar bursting in now with some choral vocal it sounds like, could be synth of course. I hear definite echoes of Floyd in some of the guitar work here, kind of circa
A momentary lapse of reason, and there's some nice almost acoustic guitar too. This time we end on pealing bells (very Doom Metal!) and then birdsong (not quite so Doom Metal) with hi-hats tapping out a sparse rhythm before the guitar growls in and we head into the closer, “Solstice”, which is the shortest track at just over thirteen minutes (never thought I'd utter
those words!) and has some nice eastern influence on the guitar in places.
And rather quickly it's over, with a big booming clap of thunder (very appropriate) and pattering rain hissing into the distance and fading out.
Overall impression: Yeah, I really liked this. Gripping stuff, and not half as crushing or cloying as I had been led to believe.
Hum Factor: 0
Surprise Factor: 9
Intention: May listen to his debut now.