a very influential project is nine inch nails, founded and mainly driven by trent reznor. i first stumbled about nin when listening to a video called last poet, using the song hurt from nin‘s the downward spiral album. that song made me buy that album, and i already dedicated two posts on spielwiese to the song hurt. another famous song from that album is closer, coming with a rather disturbing music video:

another song i want to present is the hand that feeds from the album with teeth.

another awesome song from that album is besides you in time, which i already presented on spielwiese. another example for the more rocky side of nin is discipline from their newest album the slip, released in 2008.

besides rock songs, there are also very different nin songs. one example is the 7:33 minutes instrumental corona radiata (some speculations about the meaning of the title can be found here). it’s a track best listened to loud.

(remember to turn the volume down again.) the album the slip can be downloaded from its official site.

a very astonishing release by nin is the ghosts i–iv album. 36 tracks, created in a process of improvisation and experimentation. combined with the beautiful booklet, this piece of art is my favourite nin album (next to the downward spiral). i want to present four tracks from the album. the first is 2 ghosts i, a slow piano oriented piece.

the second is 12 ghosts ii. starting slow and calm, as the above track, it evolves into something more powerful after approximately half of the time.

the third is 14 ghosts ii, an impulsive, funky tune. hard to describe.

the fourth is 32 ghosts iv is centered around a single piano key, rythmically played. somewhat mesmerizing.

ghosts i can be downloaded for free on the ghosts homepage; you need to go to the order page and select the free version.

blackfield is a project by the british prog mastermind steven wilson and the israeli rock star aviv geffen, playing alternative and art rock, sometimes even pop. the first song i want to present is from their first album, blackfield, and called blackfield. it comes with a beautiful music video, which for whatever reason didn’t show up in the music video series.

(apparently the video does not work in all countries, for example in germany. if it doesn’t work for you, try this version of the song without the video.)

the second piece is the opener of their second album, blackfield ii, titled once. it was also the opener on their tour in 2007, when i first saw them. this is a live recording, but of very high quality, both the video and the sound. if you want to watch the band, click into the window to open it in youtube.

a very beautiful and calm song from their first album is lullaby:

another beautiful, more rocking song about love is epidemic from their second album:

finally, here’s a song from their first album, called cloudy now. it’s in fact a song written by aviv geffen, which he used to play on his solo tours, which was then translated by steven wilson to english and recorded by the two. it’s a somewhat doomy, depressing song, and one of the most impressing i remember from the concert.

(and yes, aviv also iteratively removed his tops during the switzerland concert, until ending up as in the video. i think the girls liked it :-) )

tiamat is a rather versatile swedish band. starting as a death/black metal band, they evolved to a gothic/doom rock/metal band with heavy progressive and/or psychedelic influences, producing a wide range of music which is sometimes not even near to metal anymore.

let me start with two wonderful instrumental, experimental tracks. the first is planets from their famous album wildhoney, from which i already presented gaia on spielwiese:

the second is sumer by night from their album judas christ:

while often playing with such instrumental, almost psychedelic parts, they also play various types of metal. a very easy going song is brighter than the sun from their album skeleton skeletron, which is almost a bit like popular music, wouldn’t it be so dark, so black:

any color you like as long as it’s black
you could have anything if you just give it back

two other songs i like a lot are cain and ten thousand tentacles, next to each other on the album prey. they are best listened to one after another, as ten thousand tentacles is an instrumental continuation of the ending of cain. a very fascinating piece of music.

another song from the same album, the pentagram, with lyrics taken from a poem by aleister crowly, is a very calm song. it’s pretty long, and contains many beautiful instrumental soundscapes.

finally, here’s a track from tiamat‘s newest album, anathemes, called katarraktis apo aima (greek for a waterfall of blood).

this is part ii of my sentenced post, presenting the more gothic side of later sentenced. i want to start with a song from their 1996 album down, the first one with their new singer ville laihiala. it’s the song sun won’t shine, about love and sorrow.

the sun won’t shine on me without your love …don’t you know
the cold wind kills the flame in my heart …by its blow

the second song is from their fifth album, frozen. my most favourite of their albums. and this song is also my most favourite sentenced song. a song about the end of fall, the beginning of winter. its name is dead leaves.

the wintry frost comes crawling,
freezing all life that’s on its way.
the first dead leaves come falling,
hovering in the air with the rain.

the third song is from their sixth album, crimson. more in the him style. yet another song about death, and about (the end of) love. yet another very sad song.

the fourth song is from their seventh album, the cold white light. again, a song on love and death, one of the constant themes of sentenced albums since the love & death ep. “may death again us unite…”

my heart went down with you
at your funeral I was buried, too
my life … it ended with yours
and i… exist no more

another very beautiful and very sad song from that album is no one there, which i already presented on spielwiese.

the final song is from sentenced‘s last album, the funeral album. in 2005, sentenced announced that they want to disband and never again reunite. this album was their good-bye present, their headstone. resulting in a last final tour, which i unfortunately missed (so i have never seen them live), with a dvd recording of their final concert in oulu, finland. the dvd was released under the fitting name buried alive.

i do not just want to present a song, but a music video. i make this distinction because i (and many others) think that another song from the album fits much better to this video. in fact, you can play the video muted, and play along that song, and it fits perfectly. the video is called ever-frost, named after the song from funeral album. it is an aggressive song filled with hatred (read the lyrics here), similar to the style of most of their final album. the song is probably aimed at their enemies, at their critics, maybe as retribution for the hideous accusations following their release of the song routasydän (see here for more information).

the song fitting better to this video is end of the road, the last song from the funeral album.

here we are, now lay the burden down
we’re coming to the end of our road
sorrowful yet glorious somehow
to be humming this one last ode
so calm and still… it wasn’t all that bad, or was it now?
fulfilled… it doesn’t only hurt to end it now

the video itself is rather self-ironic, depicting one of the reasons why sentenced said they won’t rejoin, combining with a ritual funeral of the band, held by themselves. a fantastic video.

i want to end this double post with mentioning that miika tenkula, sentenced‘s lead guitarist and main songwriter, passed away in 2009. this makes the disbanding definite, forever. miika, rest in peace.

my most favourite (metal) band ever are sentenced. founded in muhos, finland, they started as a death metal band in 1989, and continued their journey through various styles of metal before reaching their end in 2005 with the release of their funeral album. i decided to write two posts on sentenced, beginning with their early work. if you prefer gothic metal and don’t like death metal, better wait for part ii which i will probably finish tomorrow.

the first song i want to present is from their first album, shadows of the past. descending curtain of death is a midtempo melodic death metal piece.

their second album is north from here, from which i want to present the song northern lights. another piece of melodic death metal, including very beautiful and slow parts as well as aggressive, fast parts. something i still have to do is to travel to northern finland during winter, sit down into the snow during night, watch northern lights dancing at the sky, and listen to this song.

the third song is from their album amok, the last full album with their singer taneli jarva, who left the band and later founded the black league. the song nepenthe, a melodic balad, also resulted in a music video, in fact the first one by sentenced. here it is:

after the release of amok, sentenced produced an ep called love & death, the last result featuring taneli. from this ep i want to present the song love and death, one of my favourite sentenced songs. fast paced, it is a beautiful, yet sad song about two main themes of sentenced, namely suicide and love. “love and death… go hand in hand once more.”

finally, here’s an interesting death metal piece which was only released in 2008, though it was recorded already in 1994, but not taken onto amok.