ANATHEMA

3.5 stars. I don't have the DVD of this concert only the audio. ANATHEMA were one of those bands I discovered early on when discovering this site. Their PINK FLOYD vibe and atmosphere along with the heaviness at times won me over rather quickly. Albums like "Judgment" and "A Fine Day To Exit" especially resonated with me. Man these guys have changed over the years. When I first heard "We're Here Because We're Here" I couldn't believe it was the same band but to my ears they sounded better than ever. So talented these Douglas and Cavanagh siblings that make up this band.

I feel I didn't do my homework for this one as they have released three live albums and I pick the acoustic one. Kind of a pet peeve for me these unplugged and acoustic records which is why Folk doesn't do much for me. We get 15 tracks with nine of them coming from the "Distant Satellites" and "Weather Systems" albums. Kind of cool to hear some old classics in there too. Man this is emotional music. I have mental health issues and had a rough two days last week and I couldn't listen to this record, just way too emotional at times. It was pretty cool though to listen to this band again it's been a while.

Two discs worth about 51 minutes each. I have a top three for each disc, in fact I'd love to have these six tracks on a cdr, an EP of moving acoustic music. So on disc one that three song run of "Untouchable Part 2", "Thin Air" and Dreaming Light" just melts me. So uplifting as well. You know I listen to these tracks and think this is an easy 4 stars but then a lot of the newer tunes done unplugged just don't do much for me. Disc two is about the classics like the opener "Temporary Peace" and the two closing tracks "A Natural Disaster" and "Fragile Dreams". Tough not giving this 4 stars but I need electricity! Regardless this is a moving album with a nice track selection.

Thank Heaven, the Cavanagh brothers and Duncan Patterson quickly realized that Darren White as a vocalist was simply not suitable for Anathema, so he was dismissed from the band, and Vincent Cavanagh took his place, and it was he who became the main vocalist from The Silent Enigma. The replacement was really successful: although Vinnie somehow did not know how to sing then, but compared to what was on the Serenades, the vocal component shone with new colors, because Vinnie showed his ability to convey thoughts through vocals as emotionally as possible. With Vinnie as vocalist, the main creators in the band, Daniel Cavanagh and Duncan Patterson, seemed to spread their wings, and The Silent Enigma was an incredibly big step forward.

In fact, we have a hyperemotional doom-death with an excellent vocal pressure and tragedy and more or less distinct structures of compositions, in which the sprouting roots of the brand Anathema are already visible. Personally, among other songs, I single out the opening Restless Oblivion, almost emo-doom Shroud of Frost with a stunning second half and a very depressing spoken word, a little melancholic and psychedelic ... Alone and, of course, the legendary A Dying Wish. Yes, perhaps, it is The Silent Enigma that is more worthy of being called a classic of death-doom (or doom-death, as you like). In addition, from the classical period of discography, this is the best that Anathema could offer at that time.

I must say that even though Anathema has the status of one of the pillars of doom-death, it is simply difficult to come up with a worse start to their career than Serenades. Perhaps the main problem is not in the ugly compositional structure of songs and even not in tortured riffs. The main problem with Serenades is vocals. Seriously, this is one of the most disgusting vocal performances I've heard in a long time. This is how I growl when I try to sing along to different death metal and similar genres. Darren White, with all due respect, is not the kind of vocalist who is able to set the necessary emotional tone for the sound of the band. Well, there is nothing special to distinguish from the songs, except J'ai Fait Une Promesse, which was sung in French (the only appearance of female vocals on the album, just a local "Ray of Light in the Dark Kingdom" of some kind). By the way, the band's attempt to "clear" the music lover's brain with a 23-minute ambient set at the end of Serenades is perceived, to put it mildly, ridiculously.

All of a sudden, brave creators from Liverpool decide to go back to their ideological roots, and not just anywhere, but straight to the fan-controversial A Fine Day to Exit, and decide to continue the story of the lyrical hero who eventually (spoiler!) changed his mind to drown in the ocean near the beach in San Diego, whose coordinates gave the name to intro of the Optimist. To be honest, I find this approach a little strange, because for AFDtE, as for me, it would be good to remain exactly as it was conceived by the "anathemists" themselves, unsaid, with an open ending, giving the listener the right to choose the fate of the main character. Besides, isn't a return to the past, a rollback - not a betrayal of their own principles, dogmas for the band itself, even if only in lyrical terms?

And to hell with the concept itself, with the lyrical component, although, of course, there are hardly more lines here than in the conceptual predecessor. Let's turn to the musical component. What have the eternal prophets presented to us on a saucer, who are fit to create their own religion and anathematize every parishioner for good, though known only to the group, purposes? And then out of my mouth comes a desperate and hopeless: "Eh, how come?". First, the "electronic" ending of the last album did not receive proper development. Although I admit initially that this is all subjective by and large, but still Leaving It Behind and instrumental San Francisco look much weaker than Distant Satellites and Take Shelter. At the point of the route marked by the city in the style of disco, the band so generally sounded almost like the eternally despised Coldplay, with whom the band was sometimes compared in the context of recent albums, although even a hedgehog can understand that Anathema wrote songs many times better. Here, the group took a serious step back.

As for the classic songs, the group again, for the fourth time in a row, writes the same thing, trying to cross out the logical ending in the form of the title song for the group from the same Distant Satellites, with the difference that the melodies have become weaker and more nondescript. I don't know what the situation is, whether Danny is in a state of mind, which is about the time of recording the album, caught another mental problems, or in the long course of recording the album itself. A sense of deja vu is present even among the songs themselves, when Endless Ways and The Optimist begin almost identically, despite the fact that they follow each other.

It's funny, but at times the Optimist still does not disappoint, but pleasantly surprises. Post-rock song Springfield is really beautiful with its appropriate cold beauty (perhaps the best song on the album), Ghosts and Wildfires adequately accumulate a mixture of the classic sound of Anathema and subtle inclusions of electronics, and Close Your Eyes along with You're Not Alone from the last album can rightfully be considered as the most unusual song of the group. Beautiful and elegant dark jazz, which would like more timekeeping.

At the same time, I have no questions about the technical side of the execution. Everything is as always good and verified. The only thing that bothers me (and the band lives, unfortunately, confirm this) is that Vinnie has started to give up on his vocals. Lee Douglas, on the other hand, remains at her old, very high level, and this time there's a hell of a lot of her on the album itself. Yes, I am certainly happy to hear her wonderful, feminine voice, but in comparison with past albums, she was somehow indecently given a lot of solo numbers. An attempt to equalize the rights of vocalists in order to bend under the current social trends? In fact, it's a consequence, as I said, of Vinnie's declining vocal range.

If Anathema were not in double demand as post-progressive rock prophets and undisputed masters of their craft, it would be possible to give up on this under-sequel of A Fine Day to Exit, because it really does not deserve the level of such a beautiful and diverse album, just as it does not deserve the level of its predecessors, which are among the best albums of Anathema. Alas, the reality is that with this album, my favorite English people from Merseyside have definitely failed. As if not to be Optimistic about the controversial end of the history of the most beautiful band, as it was with Porcupine Tree or Isis, and everything is going to this, given that the band went on indefinite leave, and Danny announced a new solo album and a project called Weather Systems, declared as "a continuation of the legacy of the previous group".

For the tenth album in their career, the Liverpudlians approached the status of inveterate prophets in the field of the so-called "post-progressive". The sea and cloud spheres have already been passed on the previous 2 full-length albums, and it's time to conquer space and its reliable, but so Distant Satellites.

It would seem that the time has come to explore new ways to communicate your philosophy and experiment with them, but no matter! The band seemed to intuitively feel that it still has something to say since the days of Weather Systems, and the first 2 songs already evoke a direct association with the Untouchable dilogy. Yes, structurally, the first 2 parts of The Lost Song really repeat the masterpiece dilogy. Does this mean that it is necessary to brand Anathema for self-plagiarism? Not a damn thing! I don't know how they do it, but The Lost Song has something different from the Untouchable, plus, I think it was on this album that the duo Vinnie and Lee finally found the optimal balance for the group in terms of vocal parts. Only one thing is unclear: why do we need a frankly useless and unnecessary third part? Well, to hell with it, actually.

In general, it is still a big mystery to me how this band still does not have the same popularity as its colleagues from Muse and Radiohead. The desire of the band itself not to be so mainstream? To be honest, for me, hits like Ariel, which is dedicated to Danny's newborn daughter, or the tense Dusk, would be just monumental rock hits of the 2010s, in an age when the aforementioned bands are now releasing outright hack work, blood from the nose is needed by bands like Anathema. And the title track for the band was just a wonderful epitaph, in which the guys finally expressed everything they wanted to say in these 11 years since the release of A Natural Disaster, and crowned it all with a magnificent and sensual solo.

After such a catharsis already in the middle of the album, the band begins to think about how to finally explore these attractive outer spaces with a mixture of "cold" and technological, but such attractive electronics. And if the very bold You're Not Alone (the most unusual song of the new Anathema) demonstrates rather a chaotic flight on a rocket and going into space, then the title track for the album already demonstrates these cosmic deposits in full. It is amazing how, even in the experimental and transitional field, Anathema shows his mastery in conveying the atmosphere and his notorious "philosophy". And Distant Satellites is a great example of this: Vinnie's sensual vocals, beautiful synth passages, juicy trip-hop beat-everything works at 100% and delivers exorbitant pleasure as much as the most beautiful hits of Anathema. Take Shelter is just a great finalizer of this album, even if it loses a little bit of the title track in the impact on the listener. Although many fans did not appreciate the band's electronic endeavors, I welcomed them with great and undisguised pleasure.

Distant Satellites is a transitional album in all respects, which is slightly inferior to its two predecessors, but it is still an excellent release with its own special atmosphere and a solid set of songs, among which "electronic" things stand out strongly. It's just a pity that they won't get a good development in future. Fortunately, this does not concern the Distant Satellites themselves in any way.

When you start talking about what is dear to you and loved to the depths of your heart and soul, it is always difficult to find the right words, epithets, metaphors to describe the feelings and emotions burning inside you. If We're Here Because We're Here stole my heart, used it a little and fed it, and then returned it to its rightful owner, then Weather Systems made this heart its own property.

All the best things start at the very end, and my introduction to Anathema began with the closing Internal Landscapes. I was blown away by how sensual it was, how genuinely sincere, and how the pathos was twisted to the maximum. I delayed my acquaintance with the album itself a little, coming to it gradually. I had already fallen in love with the Untouchable dilogy and the above-mentioned song, but I was afraid to be disappointed sometimes, even though I already knew that Anathema would be serious and lasting with me. And for the first time, I wasn't as impressed as I thought I would be.

To be honest, the whole Weather Systems is built on the same patterns, both its own and the patterns of the last album. All the songs follow basically the same canons, the same pattern, but that doesn't mean, damn it, that the album is monotonous and bad. I think I was able to see such an elusive feature of this album, as a complete immersion inside myself and inside the band itself, to be precise, inside Danny himself, who again became the author of almost all the songs on the album, only The Storm Before The Calm was written by John Douglas. No wonder Danny himself says that it is difficult for him to listen to Weather Systems, since the lyrics on the album are very personal for the older of Cavanaghs.

The deep emotionality of the release at some point completely conquered me, and I could no longer resist the endless beauty of this almost masterpiece. Neither the extraterrestrial majesty of Untouchable, nor the perfect embodiment of femininity in the person of Lee Douglas and her solo part in Lightning Song, nor the duality of The Storm Before The Calm (for a reason it is so different from the other songs on the album, due to the direct involvement of the drummer already mentioned above), nor the softness and lightness of The Beginning and the End, nor the epic melancholy of Internal Landscapes. Truly, there are no passing compositions for me here, Weather Systems have long, deeply and reliably settled in my heart. This is the best album of Anathema of the new period, which is slightly inferior to Judgment, but by a large margin wins over all other albums. I just don't know what words to choose for this album, these songs, when there is only one endless delight burning in my mouth.

For 7 long years, Anathema did not release anything big and new, but during this period the band held many concerts, which resulted in the reconciliation of Danny and Vinnie, as well as as many as 2 concert DVDs, on one of which, for example, a whole Comfortably Numb was covered. And in 2008, the band released a good acoustic compilation, Hindsight, in which the old hits of the band were transformed in a softer light (although, it would seem, much lighter), especially for Fragile Dreams and Angelica. Well, not about this collection, but about the album, which presented the band in a new, fully formed guise of the apostles of light, love and goodness, and if you are not sick of the combination of these 3 words in one sentence, then most likely, you will definitely have a good relationship with the new Anathema.

From the very first notes of Thin Air and the first lines uttered by Vinnie's gentle voice, you are immersed in this bright, sunny atmosphere, you feel that love is really freedom in time and peace. The meeting with the inevitable is delayed by the restless and nervous, but awesome Summer Night Horizon, which is a kind of light greeting to the beginning of the noughties, and then... the infinitely magical and touching Dreaming Light, my personal favorite, Everything, from which the stingy male tears of happiness strive to spill, the truly angelic song Angels Walk With Us, in which the vocals are performed by the notorious Ville Valo from HIM, and the epic A Simple Mistake with almost the best crescendo in the history of the band. And the overall impression of the album is not at all spoiled by either the frank filler Get Off Get Out, or the slightly delayed instrumental Hindsight, which closes the album (although this will still affect the final score). To tell you the truth, if I were in the guys' shoes, I would have made Universal the final song. Of all the songs of Anathema written by Vinnie, this one is his best work. At its core, it really feels like the final chapter of WHBWH, summing up everything Cavanagh/Douglas have had to say over the past 7 years.

By the way, a remarkable fact: all this splendor was mixed together by the maestro Steven Wilson, known to you all from his work in Porcupine Tree, No-Man, Blackfield and many other bands/projects. We're Here Because We're Here is by all accounts a great album that has already become a lifetime classic among the band's fans. If the guys would get rid of Get Off Get Out, I would give this work an unquestionable top ten or close to it.

The existence of acoustic Hindsight in the Anathema portfolio seems to me rather a delay in the release of We're Here Because We're Here, because by the time this compilation of acoustic reimaginings of the Liverpool formation's hits came out, there have been no full-lengths for 5 years since A Natural Disaster, and fans longed to hear something new from their favorites.

The above confirms about half of the tracks from Hindsight. Did it make sense to remake, say, Inner Silence or Flying? I find this question quite rhetorical. The family union of the Cavanagh brothers and brother/sister Douglas resolved this issue in different ways. In the context of the tracks already mentioned, as well as Temporary Peace and the title one from A Natural Disaster, the rhythms and arrangements on the surface have not changed one iota. A strange decision was to frame One Last Goodbye in an acoustic shell, and as a result, the composition, which is deliberately pathetic, is necessary as a light air, lost this serve, becoming just pretentious and uninteresting ballad, which is trying to break out and light a bright flame all around, but it's not happening.

However, in terms of other songs Anathema really tried and gave some songs a new, beautiful, soft point of view. A striking example is the opening Fragile Dreams, a powerful hit from Alternative 4, which in the reimagined version became even more explosive and, of course, incredibly beautiful in its simple but ingenious tragedy. A grim hit from Eternity, Angelica, in the acoustic version became contemplative, getting rid of thick metal riffs. Are You There, it would seem, does not require any radical acoustic alteration, but Daniel managed to make a different from the original and a beautiful version of this ballad, and by the way, this version then fit on the collection of the best hits Internal Landscapes, released 10 years later.

The bottom line is simple: half-remarkable, half meaningless, Hindsight, however, is a worthy example of another facet of Anathema's talent in creating deep and soulful songs.

A really telling name was chosen for the album by members of Anathema. It was born, by the way, in a conversation between Danny and Duncan Patterson, when they reconciled with each other. As stated by the Cavanagh brothers, at the time they were in a closed confrontation with each other for personal reasons, and this at some point led to the fact that Danny wanted to leave the group. Fortunately, this did not happen, moreover, the third of the Cavanagh brothers returned to the band after a long absence ? Jamie, Vinnie's twin brother, who took over as bassist after the departure of Dave Pybus. Nevertheless, the inner state of Danny is absolutely accurately reflected in the new material, which is almost entirely written this time by the eldest of brothers (only Balance is co-written with Vinnie and John Douglas).

I see Natural Disaster as the album that became a kind of point of no return for the band. This LP of the "new" Anathema is unique in that, unlike the subsequent bright and optimistic albums, A Natural Disaster attracts exactly some kind of alienated, slightly gloomy, sad atmosphere. Against this background, the names of the first 2 tracks look very ironic, with such a sign! Although, maybe the band meant exactly the perfect harmony and balance that they finally found on this album.

From the first time I did not understand this album, I honestly admit, and I thought about putting it off until better times. The only thing that attracted me was the unusual Closer, and even then it was unusual because of the very skillful use of the vocoder. Later, however, the beauty of Natural Disaster began to unfold for me like a lotus bud. And here you are already clinging to the soul and pathos of Harmonium, and soulfulness of Are You There? (in which Danny again turns to the topic of losing a loved one), and the piercing aggression and darkness of Pulled Under at 2000 Meters a Second, and the hopelessness of the title song (Lee Douglas finally sings solo!), and the serenity of Flying, and the unexpected instrumental about 11 minutes with a well-chosen title Violence simply amazes with its mixture of the entire sound of the album, where sentimentality and aggression collide with each other and form a kind of yin and yang. By the way, in addition to Vinnie, on this album, Danny himself sings solo on 2 songs at once (Are You There? and Electricity), and what's funny, some reviewers confused the voices of Vinnie and Danny (although objectively they are completely different)!

On Natural Disaster, the band went even further from its musical past, but it adapts some ideas from there and turns them into new, unique things, like, for example, it happened with the aforementioned Pulled Under at 2000 Meters a Second, but the trend remained the same: Anathema continued to modify its musical vector, and it seems that on A Natural Disaster, they finally found the necessary and convenient sound. The verdict is simple: despite a couple of tracks (Balance and Electricity), which in my subjective opinion are rather boring, the album is really great, and I love it almost as much as the previous two.

With that creative vector that Anathema has formed, it was hard to guess which way the band would move on the next release. And so it turned out that the Liverpudlians decided to try to experiment not only with the sound, but also with the format of the material, because they planned to make a concept album, the first in their career. The essence of the concept is the progressive movement of the lyrical hero down the spiral (almost like in Trent Reznor's 1994 masterpiece The Downward Spiral) straight to suicide. Sounds intriguing, doesn't it?

However, do not rely on chewing the meaning and plot from the mouth of Vinnie or anyone else from the group - the canvas of Anathema is cut into unequal pieces, which, with all the desire and perseverance of the listener, will not reveal the true storyline. And band members themselves, it seems, did not fully understand exactly how and in what order to listen to the compositions they wrote; in the 2015 remaster, the intro of A Fine Day, which was thrown out of the original release, is added, which resembles Panic in its nervousness and despair, and the original songs are mixed in a radically different order (for example, the same Panic and the Pressure opening the album are located in the middle of the album). However, I personally prefer to listen to the album in the original order.

And how are things going, actually, with the music? It was just a wonderful alt-prog-rock record. As you know, all the best of 2000' alternative starts with one name ? Radiohead. This infection, which I do not like with every fiber of my soul, has turned heads of our Liverpool heroes. Another thing is that I really like the ideas of Radiohead, but the way they implement these ideas, I'm sorry, I can't stand it, and I'd rather listen to the Radiohead-esque album from my favorite Anathema, who made these ideas in the best possible way. By the way, even now this album is often underestimated and not remembered at the mention of the name of Anathema, and I can not even find any explanation for this phenomenon. Although, probably, the matter is in several existing factors, the main of which is that 2 years before A Fine Day to Exit, Judgement was released. The uneasy fate of the successor to the great album also befell A Fine Day to Exit. Moreover, the focus on alt-rock confused even many fans of the band's last 2 albums. And very wrongly, because this album, despite the concept that runs through all the songs as a leitmotif, is full of treasure. These are the first 2 songs, slow Pressure with a haunting chorus and Release with a slight touch of electronica, and wonderful alt-rock Leave No Trace, written by Vinnie, and psychedelic-evil Underworld and Panic, and tragic Barriers (again a duet of Danny Cavanagh and Lee Douglas) and the title song. Anathema also did not forget about the concept itself, and their lyrical hero ends... (?) And then the Liverpudlians cut the story short, leaving it up to us to interpret the end of the album, whether the hero really killed himself in the cold ocean or decided to wait. The answer to this question will be given 16 years later, but this is already another story.

In the end, we have a unique work in the Anathema discography, which is underrated by the fans, but no less beautiful in its melancholy and depressive nature, and I think the band has finally reached maturity on this album. And although between Judgment and A Fine Day to Exit, I would still prefer the former for, let's say, greater ambition and elegance, the feeling that this work did not come from here, A Fine Day to Exit is valuable precisely for the band's attempt to do something extremely separate from the rest of the work and at the same time deeply beautiful.