reviews
Amber Asylum - Milwaukee Metalfest XVI
Amber Asylum: If Cradle of Filth have taught the world anything, itıs to never underestimate the appeal of beautiful women to a crowd of metal geeks. Sure, Japanese-born porn star Saki St. Jermaine was signing DVDs in the back, but here were four lovely ladies engaging in a dark fusion of neoclassical and somber gothic minimalism in the middle of the second day, on the big, brightly-lit Crash stage no less. Looks or no, Amber Asylum sculpted a mood in that sweaty hall more bleak and intense than many of the festıs purveyors of comic book ³evil,² born from a desolate yet firm-handed emotional space that sure felt like funereal doom metal if it didnıt sound like it. Percussive electric cello, tender and fierce electric violin sawing and a syrup-immersed rhythm section draped around sweet vocals for the perfect antidote to the cavalcade of pissed off males. Not that thereıs anything objectionable about pissed off males at a metal festival, but Amber Asylumıs brief respite reminded the respectful crowd that there are many paths to one darkness.
Jeff Pizek, CRC Pulse Magazine, Issue 12
Amber Asylum - Supernatural Parlour Collection
In constant evolution and vitality, Amber Asylum are hovering around thespaces between breathtaking beauty, powerful intensity, fragile nocturnal moods and apocalyptic devices. "The Supernatural Parlour Collection" is the band´s fourth album, and it is in many aspects the opposite of 1999´s opus "Songs of Sex and Death", which was breathing in a mysterious, bewitched and erotic nocturnal silence. The apparition "The Supernatural Parlour Collection" is that of an ecstatic brightness that is no less mysterious, disturbing and, yes!, dark. The overall sound is powerful and clear, but within this framework of seemingly straight and catchy neo-classical avantgarde progressive "rock" (well...), their compositions are beyond any influence. Amber Asylum, more than ever, draw an unbridled vision of their own.
You wouldn´t believe that, listening to the beautiful folky progressive pop song "Silence of the Setting Sun" for the first time, featuring a yet unheard female vocalist corresponding with her powerful voice, incontract to but fitting with Kris Force´s more silent way of singing. But believe me, this album is a ghost. Its beauty is a mantle seducingly dressing a skeleton. In the beautiful stream of drums and strings, Amber Asylum composes with often sparse, but always refined and sophisticated instrumentation, this skeleton isn´t always in sight, but omnipresent. The seducing music draws the pleasant-unpleasant feeling of something that is coming or lurking behind the next corner. Every single thing - there! the tree!, there! the cup!, there! the door! - could be the deceptive gate to a macabre apparition. I experienced this when I lay in bed with the flu and turned on this fucker LOUD. It was frightening and beautiful. The opener "Black Lodge" mesmerizes with marching drums and a delighting yet disturbing harmony, the five songs in the middle of the album are a beautiful unfolding dream or intoxication, while the final "Black Sabbath" (yezzz!) is there to let the skeleton dance. This cover version would make Osbourne and Iommi shiver, it is so creepy, doomy and demonic that it easily puts every metal band trying the same to shame.
And all in all? I am certain that with my poor English I fail to meet with words what Amber Asylum are doing in sound. And this band does their best to make any comparison absurd. At least in atmosphere, and in their way to draw an unconventional and very esoteric vision of sound, one could compare Amber Asylum with certain pieces of Coil. But I feel that it is a better description, if I say that Amber Asylum grow more and more perfect in sonically searching the point where light and darkness are becoming the same, beauty becomes the nightmare and the nightmare becomes beauty. But the charming thing is - and Amber Asylum are very charming! - that all this doesn´t need to be spoken. The music does what it does, and it sounds like a ghost that appears and takes everything on to a bewitching flight where first and last things happen.
Timo Koelling (www.alkahestdivision.com), Germany
Amber Asylum - Supernatural Parlour Collection
The ambient, gothic, experimental all-girl band Amber Asylum has recently put out their fourth album to taunt your collective. Its called 'The Supernatural Parlour Collection' and includes seven tracks of soundscapes and ambient bliss.
Unlike their last, predominantly dark release, 'Songs of Sex and Death,' this new album takes you into the blackness of a closed eyelid. To understand, of course, one needs to listen to the album. A truly magnificent journey in its own right, the CD is for any listener who is ready to embrace and expand upon his or her own emotions.
Musicians include Wendy Farina (percussion), Kris Force (violin, vocals, and guitar), Jackie Gratz (cello), and Erica Stoltz (bass and vocals). This eclectic ensemble has created a sound that many feel is not quite ambient, nor full-blown classical, but an original style that many enthusiastic metal heads and black-tie audiences alike have flocked to hear.
Amber Asylum is on Relapse Records/Release Entertainment. Check them out online at relapse.com, or consult their homepage at amberasylum.com
Unsung Hero, Issue #30
Amber Asylum - Supernatural Parlour Collection
The frontiers of progressive rock are not perfectly defined, and Prog Visions is not one to contemplate the genre from a closed and traditional perspective, rather the opposite. One of our blurred limits of the genre is related to gothic music. In our pages it is possible to find information on prog bands with a dark style such as Devil Doll, Morte Macabre, or White Willow, as well as gothic bands with symphonic or progressive shades such as Dead Can Dance, Lacrimosa, This Mortal Coil, or Ataraxia. It is also true that there is plenty of progressive groups whose music presents an apparent abscence of light entirely such as Isildurs Bane, Cheval, The Voyage, or the whole discography of Goblin, to mention some examples.
In this sense, the band of which we will now review their latest album, Amber Asylum, is a very interesting group with a more than evident symphonic sound in their music, which we can definitely place in the dark side of existence.The Supernatural Parlour Collection is Amber Asylum's latest work, and it's sound follows the pattern of their three previous studio releases (Frozen In Amber, The Natural Philosophy Of Love, Songs Of Sex And Death). That is to say, chamber gothic music with magnificent voices and feminine choirs, pieces of instrumental counterpoint and precious composition filled with detail. The musicians on this album are totally female, and include Wendy Farina (drum kit, percussion), Kris Force (guitars, violin, voice), Cat Gratz (oboe), Jackie Gratz (violincello), Melynda Jackson (guitars in two pieces), Jayne Roderick (piano), and Erica Stoltz (bass, voice). With this list of instruments you can already have an idea of the music of which we are speaking.
The work begins with "Black Lodge," a long instrumental piece of repetitive motifs that evolves into a deep a crescendo. The connection with classical music is evident, as well as excellent work of the strings. "Black Swan" begins with oboe, piano, and percussion and opens itself to a melancholic voice. "Silence of the Setting Sun" has a predominant presence of the strings and a less broken voice that shapes the song into quite a dynamic piece, with a wicked instrumental middle section and percussion solo. "The Shepherd Remix" is a lonely chant- a sad piece developed with only a very slow, intimate and almost naked tempo form the electric cello. "Disembodies Healer" begins under the influence of the sound pattern from the previous piece and evolves into one of the most delicious moments of the album, concluding the song with chamber string music and a single guitar as dark as a night without soul. The instrumental work in this sequence is as masterful as it is terrifying, and the listener can easily forget to be surprised of the beauty that can be found in darkness.
"Black Lodge Reprise" is an ambient-electronic-experimental recreation of the first piece of the work and achieves good results with nearly ambient atmospheres and again the string work is impressive. The album concludes with "Black Sabbath." Yes, my friends, a version of the classic piece from one of the darkest bands in hard rock history. The influence of Sabbath is evident in many of the current progressive groups, more specifically the many corrosive Swedish groups such as Anekdoten, however is surprising to be heard here. This piece is one of the most powerful on the album, speaking in rock terms, and it constitues a refreshing vision of a great classic.
This work is completely appropriate for the prog-heads with a wider perspective and for those listeners who are not frightened by anything. Those that enjoy White Willow, Dead Can Dance, Devil Doll, or Ataraxia already know what their next purchase should be.
Juama Pujol, Prog Visions
Amber Asylum - Supernatural Parlour Collection
Amber Asylum continues to explore the realms of dark, post-classical, post-gothic music creating dark, melancholy visions out of cellos, violins, bass, percussion, and Nico-like, cold-soul vocal deliveries. Substituting stringed instruments for guitars places Amber Asylum at the intersection of high art and underground culture. The word "black" appears in four of the seven song titles here and the disc slowly builds to a powerful, gloomy conclusion with a version of "Black Sabbath" featuring fierce cello.
WomanRock.com
Amber Asylum - Supernatural Parlour Collection
OK, so its not metal, but it is underground, so we feel justified. Amber Asylum play an eclectic batch of music that spans the more experimental, classical, and ambient realms of sound. Traditional metal instruments are present, such as guitars, drums, and bass, (there's even a cover of the song "Black Sabbath" by the metal godfathers of the same name). But make no mistake, The Supernatural Parlour Collection will let your mind recess into its more cultured areas. An intriguing release that entertains on different levels, and a welcome change every once in a while. Kudos to singers Kris Force and Eric Stoltz - their voices rock.
Alex Ristic, Rip N' Tear Magazine