Beginning as a vision out of Honey Lucius’ (Ole Teigen: JORMUNGAND: DHG-DøDHEIMSGARD/DEN SAAKALDTE, and so on and so forth) LOVEPLANET became complete as Pia Isaksen (ex-NEPHILIA) joined in on bass and vocals, and the horde was complemented with Dan Theobald (FORTID, CURSE etc.) on drums, and Fredrik Falk (HerEthic, RIVER TO AINTRY etc.) for keys and effects. The debut full length album Transmission Failed was recorded in their own home studio as well as at the Supervillain HQ, where the album was mixed (by Yusaf Parvez). Not really knowing what to expect from the band name and song titles, the members of the band might give a hint to that this will be a experimental and conceptual album. The intro To Freedom By Love resembles for a few milliseconds a mosquito hovering your head while you are in the twilight zone between dream and sleep, then the song slowly catches your attention, opens up the doors to an airy landscape and launches the first full song, Godess To All. Sounding like a fusion of guitars echoing that Norwegian heritage we’ve all come to know by black metal, machine-like thumping, sweet harmonies, our instincts regarding the bands experimental foundation is validated. On top of this the vocals by Pia Isaksen are tremblingly malicious, somewhat similar to Toby Torres of SNAKE RIVER CONSPIRACY although not at all as frantic. The other vocals by Ole Teigen are fiery and spitting, and a bit arrogant. The song can not be more of a contrast than to the next one in line, Throwing Fire, where Pia’s voice is used in a completely different way, being distant and catatonic yet sweet, to a sludgy music of a solid riff, playful drums and eerie samplings. It is not without reason that the music has been mentioned with references to Twin Peaks and the works of David Lynch. To speed things up, The Swirl Of Objects is more energetic, angry and a bit repetitive song, but is again a strong contrast to its predecessor. Spiral Pathworks then shows the enchanting variability of what you can do with a guitar and digitally processed sounds, and merge it all together into an entity. The most surprising piece of the album is a interpretation of the ever so relevant Billie Holiday song Strange Fruit. How would you take on an old and grainy song from the scarred history of America without risking a mediocre result? LOVEPLANET manages to do this by doing it completely their way; the song is still slow, and it is still sad, but there has been an addition of a whole new world of guitars, noise, and a final incisive voice. Kudos. For a few seconds, The Whisper and the Sign almost, almost, almost resembles never-dying Moonlight sonata but, delusion or not, this is not the case for most parts of the dreamlike and hypnotic song that nicely continues on into the similarly surreal track Mind’s Delay. Using the lowest keys of a piano, the twisted last song Mantra begins, which would be an excellent background if you would like to meditate yourself into the darker domains of your mind. Transmission failed is an almost meditative album at some parts but it has some bipolar tendencies that will eject unpredictable moments of unmeditative music so you’d better stay alert and take it for what it is: poetry expressed as sounds. Someone has let their creativity loose and the outcome of this is very nice indeed.
The album is digitally avaliable through Itunes
-Septikemi
VITALS:
Release: 2011
Label: Self-distributed Digital Release
Avantgenre: Synthetic New Wave Black Metal
Duration: 44:02
Origin: Norway
Official site: http://www.myspace.com/loveplanetmusic
Review online since: 13.09.2011 / 18:48:53
TRACKLIST:
01 – To Freedom By Love
02 – Godess To All
03 – Throwing Fire
04 – The Swirl Of Objects
05 – Spiral Pathworks
06 – Strange Fruit
07 – The Whisper And The Sign
08 – Mind’s Delay
09 – Mantra
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