Somnium Obmutum

A dream. A weird dream. This release seems weird by so many aspects, anyway. Simply take its enthusiastic reception, for instance. It’s just as if, as soon as a metal band looks a tad beyond the worn-out stereotypes of what this awful word, metal, means for the layman – a tall, long-haired, stinking guy shouting obscenities in front of a wall of noise – it should be welcomed with unleashed praise. All the more that I’ve hard times taking Estatic Fear as a genuine “band” to begin with – far more in the lines of a studio project. Of course, it’s not given to anyone to record an album with a thirty-two minutes long song followed by another eighteen-minutes long one. The problem being, it’s obviously not given to Estatic Fear either.

I won’t deny there aren’t some moments of brilliance here. But now, if you think twice about it, the half-an-hour long song could perfectly have been rearranged into, let’s suggest, three shorter songs, without harming said moments of brilliance. Furthermore, putting two excessively long tracks which don’t really differ from each other as far as mood, pace, rhythm and structures are concerned on the same album is just another mistake. It’s surprising how listening to Ode to Solitude first, without having listened to Somnium Obmutum before, radically changes one’s view on the former track: Ode to Solitude, obviously, isn’t a bad song, but is literally choked by its longer, and also more memorable, sister-song. Thus let’s now exclusively focus on the title track as, once again, the two songs are basically the same, even if the airs are different (Let’s mention before doing so the two far shorter remaining tracks: Des Nachtens Suss Gedone is an instrumental lute intro which can easily be considered as being integral part of the title track, while As Autumn Calls is a totally disposable transition featuring the good old rain-and-thunder samples, unpleasant synthetic keyboards and a handful of wind instruments all playing the same refrain for a few minutes).

Granted, defining Estatic Fear’s sound isn’t easy matter. Given the all-but-negligible part played by instruments like lute, cello or flute, some cover-all tag a la “orchestral metal” first comes to mind, just before you realise that could include any band from Therion to Rhapsody which all have little to nothing to do with each other, and have little to nothing to do with our current release either. By the way, Estatic Fear has dropped any kind of proper orchestration, and the aforementioned instruments are used in a significantly non-orchestral fashion. Further, the tempo is undoubtedly slower-than-average, and the release shows more than a couple of typical doom riffs; however the music is definitely not crushing enough, mostly because of the many pure lute/acoustic guitar/piano parts, to be called plain doom. The raspy electric guitars, the occasional blastbeats (if the drummer is mediocre that’s not the point), and by several aspects the lead voice strongly evoke some form of black metal. To wrap up everything, the overall vibe is typical gothic. Make your choice, lad! Some sections aren’t even close to any kind of metal to begin with.

Hey, that’s the rub, actually – on so many moments you’re enjoying a good slice of melodic black/doom metal, and the track suddenly deviates on a pretty boring lute-only section. You’re beginning to enjoy the lute, and now it’s time for a soloing female voice of little interest. Finally, guess what? Somnium Obmutum becomes frustrating, even annoying. The climax of is indeed reached around the eighth minute, when the band has been exploiting a wide range of variations around a same recurrent theme (let’s call it the “main” theme) for several minutes. At 9:30 a secondary theme is substituted, which will again undergo the same kind of variations. However once the twelfth minute or so is passed the song will never find again such a strong architecture or, to put it more clearly, the last twenty minutes are filling music with occasional sparks of light. Of course the main theme is sometimes re-surfacing, if only under disguise, to ensure a semblance of coherence, but this isn’t enough to prevent half of the track from being nothing more than slightly sleep-inducing background music. Let’s also admit the most metal moments, let’s broadly summing it to those featuring drums, are generally the best. Acoustic solos might be well-played and add a lot to the overall feeling of weirdness and uneasiness, but they’re far too lengthy, as well as often a tad easy. And coming to those tired female vocals... well, tell me about a useless addition!

Somnium Obmutum is indeed one of those albums you’ve got to listen to in specific conditions, in a specific moment of the day, in a specific state of mind, to fully get into it and appreciate it. That alone should be enough to prove it certainly isn’t a masterpiece; a masterpiece may be hard to get into – what isn’t the case with this release, by the way – but eventually imposes itself as mandatory. Don’t get me wrong, I happen to like this album, as well as the other Estatic Fear output. They won’t nonetheless leave the category of background music. A weird dream. Dreams require being asleep first, don’t they?

Highlights: Des Nachtens Suss Gedone/ Somnium Obmutum