Copyright © 1988 4AD
1. The Host Of Seraphim
2. Orbis De Ignis
3. Severance
4. The Writing On My Father's Hand
5. In The Kingdom Of The Blind
6. The One-Eyed Are Kings
6. Chant Of The Paladin
7. Song Of Sophia
8. Echolalia
9. Mother Tongue
10. Ulysses
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An enigmatic form of primitivism underlies the coating of slick mideval pop and period pieces on modern instruments from these Europeans, achieved through the darkening of expectation within which a realization is expanded into the sensual and mental pleasures of the basic elements of life. With passion and sometimes too much art school indulgence, this album is lessened not by that but by the periodic intrusions of excess pop via one of these two composers.
Strings, pipes, drums and vocals collide softly to form slowly-emerging phrases which curl around a melodic intrigue and develop it over time with a simple delight in the motion of sound. Both composers sing, but it is Gerrard's translucently cryptic and beautiful vocals that command the dramatic changes in narrative that mark the more epic and time period-influenced work on this album. Linear melodies join in counterpoint competing for space in an overlay of changing symbolic matrix, altering a soundscape and the fabric upon which the dominance of vocals, whether single or in background chorus, are employed here. There is a dangerous tendency to drift into crooner territory instead, usually featuring loosely arranged male vocals, but on this album the presence of debris from confused objectives is kept to a minimum. For a sizable portion it is the raw presence of feeling meeting intuition in the study of a story symbolic in the underlying expressions collective to our survival, wrenching powerful synergy from a handful of notes drifting gently on an open rhythm.
These songs can be like many modern primitive ventures a study in detail and sensual emotion during moments when their music is suspended to give impact to narrative, in the style one might define as folk-rock-operatic if it needed to be qualified, which balances modern influences with another extreme emotional axis but does not manage to in itself provide much for the music. In many ways, this music is less communicative than it is aesthetically powerful, but there is a perceptive level of emotion and primary human concerns (desperation, passion, vigilance) in this instance expressed that allows the emotional qualities of the virus to emerge. Especially when listener is busy with other pursuits, yet feels a craving for primal music with more peeled-open than 20,000 divas and altrockers, this music is an unleashing desire that projects its lust so formatively that its essential conditioning becomes relevant to life itself.
It is unworthy however to consider negatives with too much of a critical eye. There is no point comparing this act to others, or to allow criticisms to override its basic strength in content and aesthetic. For any who appreciate sonic landscapes in the garb of traditional musicwork this is an album worthy of celebration.
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