Dark Lunacy - Devoid

So I thought, why end the trend of Italian bands so soon?
Here's one I enjoy very much. Oblivious to this I was, until relatively recently, when a fine friend told me about this wonderful band over a bottle of scotch.
Now I bring you Dark Lunacy's debut album, Devoid.
This band was formed in Parma, Italy, in the year of 1997.

Founded by singer Mike "Lunacy" and guitarist Enomys. Joined by the first of many bassist and drummers, Harpad and Baijkal, respectively, the recorded this album in 1999 and released it the following year.

Enomys has described Dark Lunacy's music as "Dramatic Death Metal". Many of us, however, would say that they play a brand of Melodic Death Metal with strong Gothic influences and some Doom overtones.

As I said in the Lord Vampyr post, Dark Lunacy is one of those bands in Italy that writes good lyrics in what they express, but not precisely how they express them. Many of us can look past that and enjoy them (when we can understand them, anyway), but others wouldprobably find them amusing if not annoying for the sheer amount of grammatical errors.
Example?:

"From my vanish life
Take me, I run to you
And show me your beauty side
And save me
With your sacrifice"
The music itself is what I enjoy most about this band. Often sorrowful and melancholic in their own particular way, and very beautiful. It's a simple, typical formula, but the distinction comes with the addition of a string quartet, often playing simple but very beautiful arrangements that add a lot of color to the otherwise average composition. This is not to say the other instruments don't have their moments as well, but these are few and far between.
If you don't know this band but are curious, I highly suggest heading over to YouTube or the awesome GrooveShark and checking out my favorite song of theirs, and also this album's "hit", the gorgeous, brilliant track titled Dolls. I won't rant about that song alone because I don't want to create high expectations, but for many people, it's what makes them fall in love with this band. It's the song that no one can call overrated and mean it... to do so would be to blatantly and unsuccessfully try to be "kvlt" and "tr00".

Dark Lunacy - Devoid

Tracklist:

1. Dolls
2. Stalingrad
3. Forlorn
4. Frozen Memory
5. Cold Embrace
6. December
7. Devoid
8. Varen'Ka
9. Time For Decay
10. Fall
11. Take My Cry

Lord Vampyr - De Vampyrica Philosophia

Those are the two covers of this great album, titled De Vampyrica Philosophia, by Lord Vampyr.
As I mentioned in my previous post about Theatres des Vampires, this is Alessandro Nunziati's (aka Lord Vampyr) solo band.
It's very reminiscent of Theatres des Vampires, and fans of Alessandro's former band will very likely find a lot to like here, but don't be fooled. It's reminiscent; not a carbon copy. This band has its own sound and offers different things that TDV.
In relation to my previous post, I'll also state that this album is much heavier than Nightbreed of Macabria.

To those reading this and not having a clue what this is about: this is very well-played symphonic and melodic black metal, with gothic undertones, and a persistent lyrical theme about vampires and related subjects. This album in particular follows a story.
While I'm not one to demand that lyrics are good or have certain characteristic to them, I value lyrics I find enjoyable.
While Lord Vampyr doesn't seem to speak English with absolute dominion (quite far from that, actually...), a trait he seems to share with many of the more well-known Italian bands (Dark Lunacy, anyone?), if one looks beyond the evident grammatical errors, the lyrics paint interesting pictures. They are very well-expressed, in a way. And some people have stated that they find a certain charm in them. If you're a grammar nazi, then perhaps at the very least, you'll find it somewhat amusing.
Another point about this album that I value a lot, is Lord Vampyr's versatile vocals. He uses clean vox in various ranges, as well as black metal-like vocals, and a few spoken parts. That probably doesn't sound particularly varied, but there's a very clear difference between his melodious mid-high pitch clean voice and his deep, low clean voice.
Additionally, while the band is composed by the usual instruments for this type of music (guitars, drums, bass, keyboards & vox), the music feels varied. There are pianos, harpsichords, symphonic keyboards, acoustic guitars... there are blast-beats, slow piano parts, a weird keyboard solo at some point, and so on. I find that in metal, there's an endless amount of albums that have a sound. A whole album, a single sound. This is one of the reasons I had such a hard time getting nito the more extreme sub-genres like death, black and doom metal. I personally enjoy very much when I don't get that from an album, and this is one those cases. Perhaps to the average Madonna fan, a song like Die Herrschaft Des Bluts and a song like Morgana sound very much alike, but to the average metalhead, the whole composition style of the two tracks feels like a very big contrast. Indeed, the credits will reveal different members were involved in each song, and it's refreshing.


In conclusion, if you like melodic/symphonic black/gothic metal that doesn't feel like it's on one of the major labels, that doesn't give off that Dimmu Borgir or Cradle of Filth commercial vibe, you're probably going to love this. If you're a fan of Theatres des Vampires, particularly the early/mid period, you'll likely dig this too.
However, I would generally recommend this very much to anyone who likes metal in general.

Lastly, if you like this but it's new to you, you may want to check out Theatres des Vampires.


Lord Vampyr - De Vampyrica Philosophia

Tracklist:

1. De Vampyrica Philosophia (Intro)
2. Carmilla...Whispers From The Grave
3. A Sad Litany Of Vampires
4. Nocturnal Vampire's Orgy
5. Blood Lovers
6. Morgana
7. The Ophelia's Ghost
8. Die Herrschaft Des Bluts
9. ...Now...Sleep...

Theatres des Vampires - Nightbreed of Macabria

On this occasion I bring to you an album I very much like.
This is Theatres des Vampires, a band that despite the French name, hails from Rome, Italy.
I actually once had a debate with some ignorant about the language of the band's name... she said it was Italian, but it takes only a little bit of knowledge in that language to know the name would be Teatri dei Vampiri. Her argument was that it didn't "look French." I had to explain to her that it doesn't "look French" because they omit the accents in the band's spelling; otherwise it'd be Théâtres des Vampires.
Contrary to popular belief, the name translates to English as Theatres of the Vampires, rather than Theatre of Vampires.

Irrelevant linguistics anecdote aside, this band was founded in 1994, after the demise of Sepolcrum (which later became VII Arcano), by their former members Lord Vampyr and Count Morgoth, real names Alessandro Nunziati and Roberto Cufaro, respectively.
They began playing black metal, of the more melodious sort, and became increasingly so, to a point where they became more of a gothic metal band with more extreme overtones, perhaps also a bit on the symphonic black metal path, one could say.
With this album, their sixth, and the following too, they dropped nearly all of their extreme metal elements and adopted a gothic metal sound closer to deathrock than their roots.
Lord Vampyr would leave the band and instead focus on his solo band after this album, and Count Morgoth would follow after the next album, leaving female vocalist Sonya Scarlet and company in charge of the band. They shifted to a gothic sound closer to darkwave, EBM and industrial in their latest album at the time of this writing, titled Anima Noir. They have an album scheduled for release in 2011.

Personally, I think this band's best era was the mid-period, when they went softer but kept it metal, still. This is their last great album according to me, and my favorite by them, without a doubt.
Whether you're into metal of all sorts, or into the numerous varities of gothic music, but particularly if you're into gothic, metal, and gothic metal, I think this album has something for everyone.
Gothic dance-ish beats like Macabria, symphonic metal stuff with great choruses like The Jester's Shadow, sorrowful gothic rock moments like in The Curse of Headless Christ, double bass drumming over plam-muted riffs on A Macabre Banquet, vocal duets in Lady In Black... and so on.
Another thing I like about this album, is that despite the variety, it does feel like a cohesive work. There are some themes here and there repeated throughout the album, but it's not made blatantly obvious. There are also certain atmospheres achieved throughout the album with different songs. On occasion, I play only a selected portion of the album so stay within a specific ambiance. And I'm able to play another portion to seek out different things.

In conclusion if this is the sort of stuff that appeals to you, you'll likely love this, if not as a whole, at least many of the great individual songs in this opus. If you're the kind of person who uses the term "faggoth" often, you're better off sticking to the first couple of albums, 'cause you'll hate this, no doubt.

Lastly, if you like this, you may want to check out Lord Vampyr.


Theatres des Vampires - Nightbreed of Macabria

Tracklist:

1. Welcome To Macabria
2. A Macabre Banquet
3. Lady In Black
4. Angel of Lust
5. Luciferia
6. Incubo #1
7. Macabria
8. The Jester's Shadow
9. The Golden Sin
10. Carnival Day
11. Incubo #2
12. The Curse of Headless Christ
13. Mourning Day
14. The Undertaker & The Crow
15. The Beginning of The End
16. La Danse MacabriA du Vampire