the eleventh video is no one there by sentenced. a very, very sad song, and a very, very sad video. the lyrics can be found here.

this is gothic metal. you can try it.

i like it because… of the emotions it fills me with. not only the song itself, but in particular the combination with the video. getting old, being alone, losing your loved one, waiting for death. so incredibly sad, full of desperation. one of the songs making me cry almost every time i listen to it.
(unfortunately, the song was somehow edited for this video, which sounds a bit strange at one or two moments, at least if you know the original version very well…)

r.i.p., miika.

the third video is luna by moonspell, a portugese gothic metal band. the song is rather different than all others on the memorial album, but nonetheless i like it very much. a beautifully animated video. it’s a rather depressing and suicidal video though, so be warned. the lyrics can be found here.

this is very dark (slow) gothic metal. you can give it a try if you want.

i like it because… the first time i saw this song was when i watched the video on moonspell‘s homepage. it’s one of the cases where i really like a music video and the song independently. a beautiful gray world, almost no color, except red. beautifully drawn, moving, growing scenes. and a slow, heavy song. full of melancholy.
(and a note… it’s hard to find metal music videos which i actually like, when it’s not about just showing the band playing the song. and some have very strange content which simply makes no sense, like this one. but luna is a big exception.)

the first video is of the song leaves by the dutch band the gathering. it’s the first song i ever heard from them, and the song which made me get more. the lyrics can be found here.

this is (slow) gothic metal with clean vocals. you can try it :)

i like it because… it’s so powerful and yet so beautiful. i found this track on a sampler i bought on ebay called “dark winter nights” (in fact, it was the first thing i ever bought on ebay – the second thing was mandylion, the the gathering album on which leaves first appeared); i stumbled about it since i saw it contained a track by sentenced. essentially, some sentenced songs, a stratovarius live album and this cd got me more interested in metal. this song quickly became my favorite song on that sampler, and eventually made me search for more the gathering stuff.
i also like the tree parts of the video a lot, especially the night parts, as at the beginning :-) but then, i first saw this video maybe ten years after i first heard the track?

on saturday, i visited the rock 2008, a one-day festival held on königstein fortress, located in the beautiful landscape of the saxon switzerland, together with a friend. here are some pictures from the fortress:

after strolling around the fortress interior a bit, we walked near to the stage to watch the first band, krieger, a german hard rock band. usually, the first band(s) playing on a festival have the ungrateful job of killing some time, while most of the crowd hopes they’ll stop soon. often, they aren’t exactly experienced or aren’t too good. but not krieger; they played a pretty solid kind of hard rock, maybe not exactly my style, but it was good and we enjoyed it. some photos:

after krieger, a short break took place when the stage was prepared for lacrimas profundere, a german gothic metal band. the break went on pretty fast, and the band entered the stage. i haven’t heard them before, just their name. i think i have to listen to some of their albums before i can give a better judgement, but they sounded pretty good. a photo:

a very noticeable thing about this festival was that all stage reconstructions were done very fast, and the sound quality was really good all the time. i haven’t seen this combination ever before; often, it seems that the reconstruction times were eternal and the sound quality still really bad.
another admireable thing was the strict adheration of the time table. the first two bands had like 30 minutes, and the whole festival was planned to be over by around 23 o’clock, and so they managed to do. even though the doors opened a few minutes later than planned. (well, please admit it, have you ever experienced some festival or concert without any delay?)
anyway, the third band was schandmaul, a german medieval metal band. i know a bunch of people who like them a lot, but this doesn’t change the fact that i managed to not know a lot of them except a few songs, maybe. schandmaul did a very nice show. they managed to get the last bits of the party rocking and rolling. definitely a very good live band. some photos:

then, finally, it was time for the big stars of the evening, the finnish cello rockers apocalyptica. i’ve already seen them last november in zürich, and they were one of the main reasons why i travelled so far for this festival. the stage design was as usual: four large metal chairs, formed like skulls, with a huge drumkit in the middle:

their performance was, as usual, excellent. it’s always amazing how eicca and perttu manage to combine heavy head banging with playing their cellos perfectly. unfortunately, antero wasn’t playing with a burning cello this time, though. besides that, they managed to let the crowd freak out, and played lots of great songs, including some of my very favorites like prologue (apprehension) from reflections and the norwegian black metal classichall of the mountain king from cult, featuring paavo stomping around the stage while playing the mountain king. simply great. here are some photos:

after maybe one and a half hour, everything was over. we took a peek at the merchandizing booth, where the guys from lacrimas profundere were waiting for their fans to talk, being photographed, autographing and talking. then, we took the bus down to the city of königstein and walked back to our hostel, where its owner, lutz, was waiting for the concert attendees at a nice bonfire.
well, i think this concert/festival qualifies for being one of the best i’ll attend this year. the technical stuff was marvellous, the timing good (except that at least lacrimas profundere should have played a bit longer and, well, apocalyptica could have played the whole day anyway :-) ). all four bands were ranging from good to excellent, and in particular the last two made the crowd go crazy. (even though i still don’t get it why on earth one wants to have a mosh pit while a gothic metal band is playing. but then, hell, kiddies aren’t exactly predictable…)

after five (long) years of silence, tiamat released a new album, amanethes. when i listened to a few samples around one month ago, i didn’t like it too much. i still bought it (hey, it’s a tiamat album!) and, after listening to it a few times, the ice melted, turned into fire. this album is amazing. heavy, dark, gothic. probably one of the best releases this year.

yesterday i stumbled about the gathering‘s latest live dvd, a noise severe, recorded in march 2007 in chile. a few months later, their singer, anneke van giersbergen, quit the band. (which, in my opinion, is the end of the band; if they will continue, they will be something very different…)
the dvd contains a lot of songs from their older albums, like the “debut” mandylion (their first album with anneke and, in my opionion, their best one), nighttime birds, how to measure a planet? (which i don’t like too much) and if_then_else. the first two can be more categorized as atmospheric doom with progmetal and gothic influences, while how to measure a planet? drifts off into a very experimental alternative rock/prog direction; the last, if_then_else, is more into a trip rock.
well, so much about the facts.
i’ve already mentioned several times that mandylion is really good. and i’ll do it again. it’s one of the few albums (next to sentenced‘s frozen) where i like every track, to which i can listen for hours, again and again. so filled with energy, groove, raw power, emotions. so beautiful. (my favorite song is probably leaves, whose music video you can watch here.)
well, mandylion is their best album, i’d say, but they also have other good ones. one which i don’t really know—shame on me!—is nighttime birds, mandylion‘s successor, which seems to be very good, too. and there’s if_then_else, which has several really good tracks, like the melancholic saturnine or a beautiful instrumental called beautiful war.
somehow it’s really a pity that i never managed to see them.

“the day you went away
you had to screw me over
i guess you didn’t know
all the stuff you left me with
is way too much to handle
but i guess you don’t care”

from saturnine by the gathering.

after making a best of concerts list for this year, i decided to make a best of albums list for all albums i have bought until now. i divided this up into several categories:

• prog;
• punk/punk rock;
• trip hop, alt rock;
• other non-metal;
• metal: atmospheric;
• metal: death/black;
• metal: doom;
• metal: extreme prog;
• metal: folk/pagan/viking;
• metal: gothic;
• metal: power;
• metal: prog;
• metal: other.

note that this list reflects a snapshot of my current interest and remembrance of most of the albums. it could already be different in a few days. but feel free to comment or discuss this with me.

prog.

1. porcupine tree: deadwing.
2. pure reason revolution: the dark third.
3. frost: milliontown.
4. opeth: damnation.
5. porcupine tree: the sky moves sideways.

punk/punk rock.

1. die ärzte: die bestie in menschengestalt.
2. wizo: uuaarrgh!.
3. die toten hosen: kauf mich!.
4. die ärzte: planet punk.
5. die ärzte: 13.

trip hop, alt rock.

1. kari rueslåtten: other people’s stories.
2. radiohead: ok computer.
3. portishead: portishead.

other non-metal.

1. kari rueslåtten: spindelsinn.
2. nine inch nails: the downward spiral.
3. eläkeläiset: humppasirkus.
4. bohren & der club of gore: black earth.

metal: atmospheric.

1. the 3rd and the mortal: tears laid in earth.
2. finntroll: visor om slutet.
3. tool: 10 000 days.
4. anathema: a natural disaster.

metal: death/black.

note that i took out the prog death/prog black (avantgarde) albums into its own category, called metal: extreme prog.

1. bolt thrower: those once loyal.
2. moonspell: the antidote.
3. wintersun: wintersun.
4. amorphis: elipse.
5. childen of bodom: hatebreeder.

metal: doom.

i think this is the category where i could have made the longest list. there are many really good albums missing, for example down and love and death by sentenced, the other swallow the sun albums, sunn o))) and boris‘ altar, some candlemass albums, unholy‘s the second ring of power, and some more.

1. sentenced: frozen
2. swallow the sun: ghosts of loss.
3. type o negative: world coming down.
4. tiamat: prey.
5. unholy: rapture.

metal: extreme prog.

this category is dominated by opeth; therefore, i decided to list the top seven instead of the top five.

1. opeth: still life.
2. orphaned land: mabool — the story of the three sons of seven.
3. opeth: blackwater park.
4. distorted: memorial.
5. opeth: orchid.
6. borknagar: epic.
7. edge of sanity: crimson (part one).

metal: folk/pagan/viking.

1. moonsorrow: viides luku: hävitetty.
2. moonsorrow: verisäkeet.
3. primordial: to the nameless dead.
4. finntroll: jaktens tid.
5. moonsorrow: voimasta ja kunniasta.

metal: gothic.

1. lacuna coil: karma code.
2. tristania: beyond the veil.
3. lake of tears: a crimson cosmos.
4. poisonblack: lust stained despair.

metal: power.

1. nevermore: dead heart in a dead world.
2. nevermore: dreaming neon black.
3. symphony x: paradise lost.
4. communic: waves of visual decay.
5. nightwish: oceanborn.

metal: prog.

1. dream theater: train of thought.
2. the gathering: mandylion.
3. ayreon: the human equation.
4. dream theater: metropolis pt. 2 — scenes from a memory.
5. dream theater: images and words.

metal: other.

1. timo rautiainen & trio niskalaukaus: hartes land.
2. rage: lingua mortis.
3. samael: solar soul.
4. annihilator: king of the kill.
5. apocalyptica: cult.

right now i’m listening to mandylion by the gathering, their first album with the great dutch vocalist anneke van giersbergen. (if you’re interested, take a look at her new solo project agua de annique. if i recall correctly it’s not metal, so worth listening to for everyone reading here.)
this is one of the first metal albums i bought, after hearing the song leaves too many times on some sampler (called dark winter nights; that one also introduced me to rage and samael). it’s a really great, emotional song, touching me deep inside. probably the first song qualifying to be called gothic rock/metal which i loved listening to. a few lines from the song:

“now that you’re gone i don’t know
how to really feel inside
baring the hope to see you again
i guess i never will”

i’ll stop typing know, in favor of catching some sleep… closing with a tbl quote: thank you & good night!

during updating my music player, i had to think about which albums to put on it and which ones to delete. my previous playlist was really biased towards heavy and dark music, so i decided to lighten it a bit up. well, at least from the musical side. but nonetheless, i decided to add something more heavy, namely something from sentenced, which was my favorite band for a very long time. i was thinking hard about which album(s) to put on the player. maybe something oldskool from the north from here? it contains the beautiful song northern lights. or maybe the love and death ep, containing classics like love and death (go hand in hand once more) and the way i wanna go. then, there’s the down album, my favorite beauties from this one are bleed (to death), sun won’t shine (on me without your love) and the agressive i’ll throw the first rock. well, then there’s the frozen album, my first sentenced album after all, and in my opinion still the best one. it contains one of my all time favorite songs, dead leaves. besides that (and many other great songs), it contains the slow rainy ballad the rain comes falling down, grave sweet grave and the (almost) instrumental burn (the pain away). but then, there are also beautiful songs like fragile, dead moon rising and my slowing heart on the crimson album, in particular the latter being so expressive through its monotony. it’s a really sad song, only being topped by no one there, the last song on the cold white light. no one there is one of the saddest songs i know. (if you have never heard it, consider watching its video.) besides this song, the cold white light features some more songs i want to mention: namely cross my heart and hope to die (may my end come tonight), the self-ironic excuse me while i kill myself and the ballad guilt and regret. and, last but not least, there’s sentenced terminal album, fittingly entitled the funeral album, which ends the misery with the great, even though more aggressive and more hateful, songs may today become the day (as i plunge into the gray), ever-frost, vengeance is mine, drain me and end of the road. so, there’re a lot of albums to chose from. my final decision was to include exactly the songs mentioned here, instead of a whole album. i’m really looking forward to tomorrow, when i have plenty of time to listen to this great collection of misery. it’s really a tragedy that sentenced is no more. rest in peace.

here’s a list of concerts i’ve been at this year, for historical reasons. not taking in account some classic concerts.

• 07.02.2007: therion, grave digger and sabaton were playing at the z-7 in pratteln (symphonic orchestral metal, and some more thrashy/whatever metal);
• 21.02.2007: amplifier and cloudride were playing at abart in zürich (progressive art rock);
• 24.02.2007: blackfield and pure reason revolution were playing at the z-7 in pratteln (progressive rock, art rock);
• 04.03.2007: …and you will know us by the trail of dead and forget cassettes were playing at the rote fabrik in zürich (alternative rock);
• 29.03.2007: morgana lefay, sacred steel, serenity and bitterness were playing at rock city in uster (various kinds of metal: death, prog, power, true, …);
• 09.04.2007: moonsorrow, swallow the sun and some band whose name i forgot played at the z-7 in pratteln (pagan metal, doom metal, death metal);
• 10.04.2007: circle ii circle, savage circus, tomorrow’s eve and tempesta were playing at the z-7 in pratteln (metal);
• 13.04.2007: moonspell, napalm death, behemoth, gojira and dew scented were playing at the z-7 in pratteln (death and black metal, metalcore);
• 16.05.2007: spock’s beard was playing at the z-7 in pratteln (progressive rock);
• 27.05.2007: trivium, annihilator and some band which was playing before the official opening time were playing at the rohstofflager in zürich (thrash metal);
• 29.05.2007: arena was playing at the z-7 in pratteln (progressive rock);
• 31.05.2007: anathema and moondawn were playing at the z-7 in pratteln (atmospheric rock with metal influences);
• 01.06.2007: machine head, type o negative, cataract and zatokrev were playing at the volkshaus in zürich (thrash metal, doom metal, metalcore and death metal);
• 27.06.2007: dream theater and megadeth were playing at the volkshaus in zürich (progressive metal, thrash metal).

if i’ll find the motivation (and if anyone cares), i might write a few words about some of these.