Manservant

Even stones know that "Gothic" Rock and Metal is my beloved genre (though i'm under the spell of Death, Black and Power when they are superbly proposed), but for that reason should i worship any flops put (unfortunately) in circulation on a market already ultra saturated with utter crap productions of every shape and appearance? No. On the contrary,  my personal soft spot for Gothic  makes my  refusal towards album of this kind even stronger and stronger. For me, (blessed be all who like "Fire") here we have 8 inconclusive songs : listening to them till the end was a duty and never a pleasure. From time to time it was a real torture, in the better case a boredom without end. I find that the vocals of Marina are purely erratic , a too high voice which modulates the chords in order to make my ears  sick . The whole tracklisting is to me  unagreeable around the  mediocrity level. Trying to put in this album atmosphere, feeling and emotions, Ashes You Leave in my opinion showcase a kind of "meat roll"  made with tedious chords which too often don't have an exact connotation.  The brilliant but too intrusive violine doesn't save the situation. Marina's voice is in perpetual megaforeground while the wonderful male grunts is put under the shoes' soles and only rarely, like in the opener Free, we can admire it properly. Free is one of the less repulsive tracks, and it could have been a lot better if the vocals would have been better calibrated and the guitars proposed in a different way.The panic intro with related cries, screams and shouts  is in my opinion pathetic , though it could have a mega trascendent or historical  meaning. Methinks that the exotic chords typical of the East Europe musical heritage, which could be a "trump card" , are distraught into  something i cannot  personally stand: example of it is the second track In Vain, where the female vocals and the inconsistent passages  spoil the melody inside , hardly bearable  things that should be described as high notes together with an exaggerated violine, and   underemployed male vocals destroy the Balcanic-like soundscape. More rhythm one could expect from Fire, which could have a deep , catchy melody, but... patience:  the usual Marina's voice, the too soft guitars and the too interfering violine that cannot substitute a lead guitar in itself  (it should remain a little bit in background giving a push from the backscape) are able in killing  merciless also  this  track and the potential good qualities in it. I don't want to say that Marina's voice is awful or that she cannot sing, it's totally  the contrary cause she has also a big and astonishing extension with a nice timbre  and she can sing high as well as bass notes . But what i cannot simply stand is her way to put it on, the unuseful vocalisms of second hand opera , those excessive and mybe forced facets that don't enrich in my opinion  this album but on the contrary turn it into an authentical pain in the a** listening to it. Hurt is another spoiled song without a clear direction where the thunderous grunts appear just for the joy to appear. Ready to cry is one of the few tracks where the violine is really iresistibile and the guitars give a cool support: so why is it resulting boring to me? mahh :  the ways of the musical alchemy are inscrutable. Too pompous vocals in Don't forget the Planets, a song that is not successful in transmitting solemnity and ancient  emotions transposed into modern times. A Crimson Shade offers finally the shade indeed of the vocal duet that should be,  with crunchy guitars and rather speed drums, but here too Ashes You Leave are able to spoil the umpteenth song with their typical weapons helped by some vocal passages which are simply unlistenable. Manservant contains  sporadic but very contrasted duets but , guess what, it goes on, unperturbed, with  the way already drawn up  by all  previous tracks.  Leaving behind only the sad ashes of what it could be.

rating: 5/10

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