Gotterdammerung - Morphia
[The Nature of Gothic]

This album is chalked full of gothic goodness. For those of you who are looking for that total Sisters/Bauhaus post-punk era music, I think you may have just found it. Everything in the way this album was created would lead you to believe it was released over 15 years ago. Yes, even though we review some older CD's this one just came out in December on UK label "The Nature of Gothic" which by the way is a label I haven't heard anything bad from as of yet.

First formed in 1991, this gothic band from the Netherlands wanted to combine their influences, in this case being Sisters of Mercy, Siouxsie, Big Black and Sonic Youth, etc.

They released a demo in '92 called "Frantic Flesh" and a second in '93 called "In the Presence of Sorrow" which didn't do as well as the first. They released their full length release in '94 called "A Body and Birthmark"

Now finally they bring us with their second full length release after eight years, but that's alright, I was twelve when they came out with their first CD :P

The synth work in this is really interesting actually, again, sounds like they have had the same drum machine that they bought in '91, now understand this isn't a complaint, kinda makes me happy that a band would go all the way to sound retro. Even the recording quality sounds like that of an old Sister's release, or even better, it sounds like it's being played on vinyl. The vocals are fantastic; I have always been really picky with how vocalists sing, especially men.

Their title track "Morphia" is more of an intermission really, a short one and a half minutes. The next track "Echoes of Despair" is really interesting. It's starts out with a very funky tune, nice bass and guitar work, but then it fades out and a new song comes in, right in the middle of the song, first time I listened to it, I wondered why they did that. But after their Sisters of Mercy cover of "Good Things" The guitar and bass come back to say hello in a track called "6" Eventually those fade out once again and are replaced by some form of background Japanese Music, at least that's what it sounds like. And the most unexpected thing happened, the next track kicks in and it's "Echoes of Despair" again, well, sort of. It's slower, and called is "Without Your Crapes". This band shows some real creativity, I loved it, it makes this CD something you can only really listen to with the random button off.

If these guys had come out when they would have been considered modern Goth and not retro, I believe they could have gone places. There isn't one track on Morphia that I didn't enjoy. The only thing is, unless you're a hardcore retro goth fan, or over thirty, you might not be able to appreciate this.

Review By: Azriel J. Knight