The Garden of Unearthly Delights

Cathedral turned in lot of decent albums over a long and glorious career, but every one had a slightly different character. The Garden of Unearthly Delights harks back to the more extreme sound of early '90s Cathedral and skips over the more groovy, stoner albums that followed The Carnival Bizarre. There's also an angrier, faster, almost punkier tone here, though it's still as heavy and as doomed as a concrete zeppelin. Those two elements combine to make a classic Cathedral release that experiments on almost every song, something that marked the band throughout their career. That means all the songs here are interesting, even if not perfectly conceived.

All 4 band members turn in great performances here. Because the songs don't follow any set pattern, different elements of the band's sound come to the fore on different songs. The bass is particularly prominent, which provides the album with a lot of its grit and drive, plus Leo Smee is far more creative (I would suggest progressive) on The Garden than on the majority of Cathedral releases. Likewise Brian Dixon on drums, though he had free rein in the past also. Gaz Jennings is a focal point as always, and though he doesn't churn out quite the number of straight-up riffs as usual, his guitar work plays the important role of shaping song dynamics and augmenting the progressive touches that the rhythm pairing are throwing down. Lee Dorrian is his inimitable, slightly demented self, like Bobby Liebling's less worrying stepson.

The pick of the songs on here probably summarise the album quite well. 'North Berwick Witch Trials' is an incredible blast of traditional doom, with several hulking, fuzzed-out riffs that must make you band your head. The lyrics are pure history and quintessential doom tropes - witches, death, Christians - and Dorrian's voice is confident and powerful, never too harsh or too laidback, which actually makes this one of the catchiest and most accessible songs here, since straight-up doom has never been too exclusive unless it crawls along, which 'Witch Trials' doesn't. If someone asked me what doom metal sounded like, I would not choose Sabbath or Candlemass or My Dying Bride, I would play them this.

I would not, however, play them 'Oro the Manslayer', and that has nothing to do with its quality. As Cathedral songs go, this is fast. It plays about with 2 or 3 riffs that surge along without ever ceasing to be absolutely iron-plated and ball-crushingly heavy and really takes advantage of its "battle charge" opening riff, which returns several times and makes your heart miss a beat on each occasion. The lead section is also good and retains the feel of ravaged warriors going at each other tooth and nail, but its long build-up makes 'Oro' about a minute overlong, though when going for an epic doom Bathory warsong, some exceptions can be made.

'Corpsecycle' just about makes it as the next best thing on here, though that depends on what kind of Cathedral fan you are. It deserves a mention purely for opening with a sample of the London Underground and that infernal lady who announces "This is a Circle Line train" like she has just found her neighbour's dog squatting in her flowerbed and wants to say "Your dog just shat on my petunias," but doesn't want to be rude about it. The song is accessible and has a singalong chorus: it's still heavy and powerful, but it's about the daily grind of commuting, which seems like an odd theme for Cathedral to tackle.

The other songs on here are by no means bad, usually sitting somewhere between these 3 extremes, though with a slight tendency to adopt a sludgy riff and creepy quiet section for atmospheric effect. The weakest song on The Garden is 'Upon Azrael's Wings' precisely because it follows this pattern too doggedly and doesn't come up with an interesting way to do so. The long closer 'The Garden' is a real patchwork of everything Cathedral have ever thrown at a recording studio, plus quite a lot else. It reminds me of Iron Butterfly's 'In-a-gadda-da-vida' for some reason (possibly because of the Simpsons episode where Bart pretends that the opening line is "In the garden of Eden" and works the organist to heart attack), though it has no "core" riff or section, which can make it a tedious or eventful listen, depending on how you respond to the ambition of such a song.

For a band that couldn't stop breaking new ground and never really stayed still long enough to have any peers, The Garden of Unearthly Delights is a solid and experimental album that can't please everyone all the time, but hits hard when it hits and misses rarely. A good album from a great band.

Here's an album that I never thought I'd hear. Cathedral has never been so angry, harsh, rough and creative.

This album is very much an opposite to VII:th Coming, which was accessible and easy to get into (melodic and groovy riffs). This one took a while to get into because of it's harshness. The casual listener need not bother with this one (well, do it anyway). There's some experimental parts in the songs that adds enormous contrast to the material as well as some acoustic parts, female vocals, strings etc. without it turning into power metal. The whole album have two sides to it, and the songs are ordered perfectly. The first half of the album is alternating on harsh vs smooth (sort of).

Dearth AD is just an intro with various atmospherical noise so I'll skip to the first song.

Tree of Life and Death... This song is noisy, distorted and heavy. Lee is using a darker voice than on the last couple of albums. While it's got the trademark rhythmic riffing, it's a lot darker and harsher than usual with several parts to it that creates contrast. Halfway into the song we enter classic Cathedral territory riffage with a slower doom tempo untli we go back into angry tempo again. One of the harsh songs.

North Berwick Witch Trials... As a contrast to the former song, this has got some Carnival Bizarre over it, instant melodic riffing, classic Cathedral. Very nice track.

Upon Azraels Wings... Back to the harsh and angry stuff this album will be remembered for. Halfway we get to some sort of soft jazzy bridge (contrast) that goes back to overdrive mode after a little while. A song which punches you right in the stomach.

Corpsecycle... Like North Berwick Witch Trials we get a little lighter song (not that light) with groove, but with a spice of roughness. I'll remember the end of the main riff for a long while. This song will probably be the favorite of the more casual listeners of Cathedral.

Fields of Zagara... A very sweet acoustic song that reminded me of Sabbath's Laguna Sunrise, but a lot darker and melancholic. A breathing pause.

Oro The Manslayer... Energy and anger. This is the most energetic and also the fastest track on the album. This is rather original for Cathedral, they haven't made many songs like this.

Beneath A Funeral Sun... Here's my favorite track on the album. It's in the same vein as "Tree of Life and Death" but with some awesome parts with eerie voices (children?) with strings in the background. After a while there's a number of different movements that further enhance the richness and contrast to the song. A few of the lines that the eerie voices sings are "Earth has fallen.....Mankind's burning...", with strings backing it up. The song ends on a slightly chaotic mode.

The Garden... This song is almost 27 minutes long, and this is where a female vocalist comes in over an acoustic background singing a very melancholic and beautiful passage. It moves into a hard hitting riff and an angry Lee is back. This song has got so many different passages and parts that I'll just say that it's a song full of contrast and creativity (and some experimentation). It could easily have been cut into 2-3 songs, but that would've ruined the whole experience a little. A great track albeit a little long.

Proga-Europa... Wow, pure Sabbath-vibes when it starts (!) from the riffage, then a progressive Lee and back to Iommi riffage/soloing. A nice jingle to end the experience.

This album will take several listenings, and it's a rewarding experience when you've gotten into it. Highly recommended.