Absenta - Official Website


Eel

Spain Country of Origin: Spain

Eel
Send eMail
Type: Full-Length
Release Date: February 20th, 2016
Genre: Black
1. You Left Me Dry
2. The Way It Used To Be
2. Burying Another Part Of Our Soul
3. Fighting In The Street
3. Howling Under Growing Oceans
4. No One Can Save Me
4. Erasing The Traces Of An Ungrateful Coward
5. Any Day
5. Eel
6. Man Without A Face
6. Requiem For A Stream
7. Fire From The Soul
8. Spark To Start A Fire
9. Love Child (Bonus Track)
10. Sooner Or Later
11. Rondo Alla Turca (Mozart / arr. Glass)
12. One Of These Days


Review by Felix on November 30, 2019.

This Fantastic Decade” was the small teaser for Feel Sorry for the Fanatic, released on a disc of the Rock Hard magazine. This song has nothing in common with the death metal tracks the band featured on their early works, but it is not too far away from the pieces of the outstanding Odium. “This Fantastic Decade” opens the album. It has drive, strength and catchiness, a good song with elements of industrial metal but without any kind of world-weariness, moaning or inadequate elements. Given this situation, it was nice to listen to this track – but simultaneously it was an act of betrayal. The opener is anything but typical for the material of Feel Sorry…. Seen from today’s perspective, it seems as if Morgoth paved the way for Ketzer, another German band that started fantastically before it lost its compass and its brain.

Feel Sorry… is a conglomerate of techno, post rock, industrial rock, independent music and maybe further styles I am not very familiar with, to express it mildly. Perhaps people who like Bulldozer’s “Dance Got Sick” wholeheartedly are able to gain something positive from the keyboard session that shows up on the fourth position. From my point of view, it’s just useless bullshit. Aggravating the situation, regular tracks like “Curiosity” also do not make my day. Yes, there are metallic guitars in the chorus, Marc Grewe does not sound very politely, and I don’t say that the song suffers from incoherence. Nevertheless, it is hard to endure the depressive, somehow drug-influenced mood of such songs, because Odium proved evidence that Morgoth can do it much better. They avoid a complete flop in view of the competently designed production and some strong melodies (“Last Laugh”, “Forgotten Days”), but this cannot conceal the crucial fact: here we are listening to a once great formation that is going astray. Marc Grewe can sing about “Souls on a Pleasure Trip” as long as he likes to do so, but in spite of the pretty intense ending of the track, my soul has been on much more pleasant trips before.

Obviously, the band wanted to break out of its musical scheme in order to find new, solvent music lovers. The atmospheric background vocals (or is it a keyboard line?) of “Graceland” sound like the light version of Graveland’s omnipresent Valkyrie-like background chants and this is just one example for the annoying fact that so many elements on this work are polished smoothly. Feel Sorry… spreads strange vibes while jumping head over heels between all stools. Dark and introvert sequences have a psychedelic touch and that’s not despicable. Nevertheless, back in 1996, Morgoth lost their integrity and, even worse, intentionally spat in the face of their following. Can’t say that I like to be treated that way.

Rating: 5.7 out of 10

  Views

Review by Tomek on November 7, 2017.

I’ve been getting a lot of interesting music to write about in my hands lately, and some of it comes from Spain. Absenta means absinthe in Spanish, and it is also the name of the band I’d like to introduce to you (if you don’t know it yet). They went through all the regular shizz in the beginning stage, including lineup changes and demo recordings and such, then to record an EP, and then to record their first album which was their attempt at melodic black metal. Not being too happy with that one, they decided to change their creative direction and make something different and more challenging. On their second full length they developed music that is depressive, avant-garde and at the same time progressive, with elements of rock and some post and groove but still menacingly black, harsh and cold. They called it Eel.

Black metal is the framework for the music Absenta creates. Such music is usually associated with aggression and speed and we have plenty of it on this record, but there is also much of slow, atmospheric brooding with beautiful but somber melodies to balance the album and make it captivating. They move through this approach effortlessly, going from wild black metal fury to atmospheric passages, from brutal heaviness to something that could almost be considered a groove, and doing it without losing a slightest bit of their unique dynamics and character. Absenta doesn’t want to stick to a single formula for even one song - which makes the album remarkable in its ever-changing structure. And then there are vocals. Ramon DR alternates his style between common-in-the-genre raspy screaming and abrasive croak, but there’s also some low growl and eerie spoken invocations. Switching between those styles makes the lyrics sound as if a possessed person was trying to tell a story and can certainly send shivers down your spine. With lyrics talking about environmental problems of decaying rivers and probable extinction of eel, every song is a tale about ongoing struggle of this peculiar fish to avoid being wiped out from the face of the planet. Everything that happens on this album musically and lyrically is constructed to bring this sinister, ungodly, disturbing feeling that saturates one’s mind with images of nature’s revenge against human selfishness.

Eel is a record that may take few listens to realize all that Absenta is trying to convey, but once discovered – it will be an album that will stay in your mind. It will embed itself deep into the unconscious and it will keep growing from there. It is dark, cold and slimy and may feel like it creeps around in your mind, slowly becoming the thing in the back of your head that you were always afraid to acknowledge. Make sure that you’re ready for it.

Rating: 8.5 out of 10

  Views

Review by Tomek on November 7, 2017.

I’ve been getting a lot of interesting music to write about in my hands lately, and some of it comes from Spain. Absenta means absinthe in Spanish, and it is also the name of the band I’d like to introduce to you (if you don’t know it yet). They went through all the regular shizz in the beginning stage, including lineup changes and demo recordings and such, then to record an EP, and then to record their first album which was their attempt at melodic black metal. Not being too happy with that one, they decided to change their creative direction and make something different and more challenging. On their second full length they developed music that is depressive, avant-garde and at the same time progressive, with elements of rock and some post and groove but still menacingly black, harsh and cold. They called it Eel.

Black metal is the framework for the music Absenta creates. Such music is usually associated with aggression and speed and we have plenty of it on this record, but there is also much of slow, atmospheric brooding with beautiful but somber melodies to balance the album and make it captivating. They move through this approach effortlessly, going from wild black metal fury to atmospheric passages, from brutal heaviness to something that could almost be considered a groove, and doing it without losing a slightest bit of their unique dynamics and character. Absenta doesn’t want to stick to a single formula for even one song - which makes the album remarkable in its ever-changing structure. And then there are vocals. Ramon DR alternates his style between common-in-the-genre raspy screaming and abrasive croak, but there’s also some low growl and eerie spoken invocations. Switching between those styles makes the lyrics sound as if a possessed person was trying to tell a story and can certainly send shivers down your spine. With lyrics talking about environmental problems of decaying rivers and probable extinction of eel, every song is a tale about ongoing struggle of this peculiar fish to avoid being wiped out from the face of the planet. Everything that happens on this album musically and lyrically is constructed to bring this sinister, ungodly, disturbing feeling that saturates one’s mind with images of nature’s revenge against human selfishness.

Eel is a record that may take few listens to realize all that Absenta is trying to convey, but once discovered – it will be an album that will stay in your mind. It will embed itself deep into the unconscious and it will keep growing from there. It is dark, cold and slimy and may feel like it creeps around in your mind, slowly becoming the thing in the back of your head that you were always afraid to acknowledge. Make sure that you’re ready for it.

Rating: 8.5 out of 10

  Views