SL I review - Convivial HermitThere has been some comparison with Paysage d’Hiver in the reviews for this Greek band, but, in all fairness, one fails to hear any direct correlation between the two outside of a certain propensity for very long, drawn-out songs, as well as a very conscious opacity of atmosphere. The recording sounds utterly modern with its mechanical, programmed sound, and there is no shortage of eclecticism with songs transforming from tranquil acoustic guitar medleys to grey electronics to long, flattened bouts of almost uniform creeping sound waves. A desire to attain an epic ethos or build-up thereof is at the core of these compositions, though they never quite manage in doing so, in my view, without first bleeding themselves dry halfway throughout by dint of their own repetition. In addition, the drum programming, in the moments in which it is used full-on as a counterweight to the movements of riffs, is extraordinarily (or perhaps, with the ubiquity of this problem in other bands, ordinarily) artificial-sounding, and in the worst cases seems engineered to move as fast as it does not because the riffs of the song necessarily demanding it, but simply because it is somehow de rigueur as a genre element. Fortunately, this is not always the case for Spectral Lore, as the music varies much throughout all seven tracks, going from slow, lilting tempos to insane speeds. I would also add that as far as I could tell bass is not used, or if it is used, it is very hard to discern; in its place existing a fuzzily treated lead to compliment the rhythm guitars. Vocals are not very distinguishing, even when effects are added in the murkiness of the recording.
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