Peccatum

Lost in Reverie (Mnemosyne/The End)
by Martin Popoff

Well, aren’t Ihriel and Ihsahn the creepiest couple goin’, eh? And still going, three records into a surreal career that has them quietly becoming the greatest, most fearless, most exploratory avant garde hard-ish act in the delicious drowning pool. And don’t worry, the nightmarish Björk-isms are often cracked open by obtuse guitar, or, in the case of “Parasite My Heart” full-on post-Emperor black metal. It’s all quite fantastic and trippy, sorta like David Sylvian opening the studio door to a blizzard once in a while. I kinda wish they’d pull an Opeth and give us a mellow album and a heavy album. Both swirling intensities are crafted with fierce, artistically successful results, and both rise to the production challenges of such madness. But it’s all Roger Waters (solo or The Final Cut) under the bridge to me: I actually have a hard time listening to this without a hand poised at the volume control… up, down… there we go, no! But man, what a triumph of sound and brains and awful emotion. Crimson, Gabriel, Kate Bush, Fantômas, Dillinger, Mastodon… Peccatum deserve a pair of serious elite party invites, but what would you sidle up an’ say to them: “So sorry you’re not dead or dying painfully.” “Yes, I know, thanks anyway. Someday.”
(www.theendrecords.com)