As a reviewer, you'll once in a while stumble upon some seemingly unknown débutante group and end up being completely surprised that you haven't heard of them before. If you can recall this type of experience then I'd like to present you the very first release from the Swedish two-piece "A Swarm of the Sun", consisting of Jakob Berglund and Erik Nilsson, two souls who have ventured deeply into the dark woods of genres and came out with something unknown, something that can only be described as a fusion between emotional apocalyptic chaos and an almost meditative art of sound fill-ins. It's like Deftones vocals combined with some of the more "all is soon coming to an end" sound of a slowed down, grotesque version of Snow Patrol. Everything assembled and fitted into a single, six track-length EP.
Most noticeable is obviously the first track "Refuge", beginning with a very slow rise from the bottom of the pitch scale, gradually moving up until breaking into a heavily distorted two to three chord riff all ending in second break to a tranquil ambience with Jakob Berglund melodically chanting: "Think you see through my wall...you don't see me at all...". The shifting between chaos and tranquility is like visualizing yourself sitting on a nosediving plane, 20 seconds before the crash. Chaos, fire and fear and then finally an almost meta-physical state of peace. Simply a great track, with a suiting ending of repeating the chaos / order cycle. The following track "King of Everything" also pursues the same cycle, though in a reverse order, which still ends up creating the same catching atmosphere. The third track though, "A Mind But Not A Mouth", is solely focused on dedicating a track completely to tranquility. It's silent, but dark and eerie and the feeling of something bad coming up next is inevitable, making it fit perfectly into the whole composition of the EP. Normally, deeply silent fill-ins don't tend to work out well, since they easily feel like something just thrown along with the 'artistic touch' excuse for not knowing what to do next, but this time it's luckily different. The same thing goes with the fifth track "An Animal in the Shape of God", which is another, almost identical sound structure. If I should say anything about this, then the fifth track could have been replaced by another, less silent track, considering the sixth track "I Fear The End" kicks in with some slow Snow Patrol-ish guitar and vocals to accompany it. It's all right, but the ending track could have been more active, so listeners don't end up falling asleep after going through the other great tracks on the release.
In conclusion, "The King Of Everything" is a very good and interesting debut album. It has its flaws in the form of repetition and a little uninspiration, but most of it evens out because of the impressive display of sound on the first and second track, not to forget mentioning the fourth track "The Grip" and its catchy riff and the blazing strumming done near the end of the song. These guys are definitely someone to keep an eye out for. I just hope that they'll develop their style even more and won't be afraid to create a full length album of both chaos / order cycles, but also completely new and refreshing sounds. My guess would be adding some string quartets, I think Apocalyptica could lend you a hand. Anyways, good luck.
[8]
Download: Refuge, King of Everything, The Grip
For the fans of: Hard to say, but Deftones and a darker, undiscovered side of Snow Patrol, A Perfect Circle
Listen: Official MySpace
30.04.2007
Version Studio
Provided by Target ApS› Related items.
