Wednesday, 24 October 2012

Whyzdom, Blind? (2012)


Tracklist:
  1. The Lighthouse
  2. Dancing with Lucifer
  3. Cassandra’s Mirror
  4. On the Road to Babylon
  5. Paper Princess
  6. The Spider
  7. The Wolves
  8. Venom and Frustration
  9. Lonely Roads
  10. The Foreseer
  11. Cathedral of the Damned


Over the past decade, metal fans have become used to the sight of symbolic metal acts striving for that rare spark of inspiration which could be called magic.  Whyzdom, a Parisian incarnation of the genre, are just such a band.  But their forthcoming album, Blind?, shows they’re much more besides: Whyzdom are mystic visionaries, foreseeing the ascent of man to the heavens; they’re intrepid explorers, discovering magical worlds unknown; and, seemingly, they’re enthusiastic zoologists, with a passion for wolves and spiders.  What they’re not are subtle, concise, or original.

A good indicator of the intentions of a band is the length of their songs.  On Blind?, it’s a sight to behold: 11 songs, fully 75 minutes in length (by my reckoning, that makes almost seven minutes per song).  It’s exactly what you’d expect.  Bombast and pomp ring from every track, while rich female tones prance gleefully amidst a soundscape saturated in every orchestral sound going.

It’s banal, excessive, and totally gratuitous.  And lest we be fooled into thinking that a band committed to established musical clichés might deviate from the accepted formula, Whyzdom’s lyrics say different.  Carefully selecting the most worn themes available to metal, they lead the listener through tales of devils and sold souls, heartbroken princesses, and fairytale lands of magic.

It often feels harsh criticising the lyrics of non-English bands.  Fortunately, in this case, there’s no need.  In a field bristling with immature poetry, Whyzdom have distinguished themselves with lyrical guff so awful that it transcends all linguistic barriers.  A fair chunk of their lines are simply reported speech, telling tales in the tone of a child recalling their daily routine.  Cramming in words in contempt of rhyme, scan, or even – on occasion – melody, the transfixed listener is carefully walked through the complexities signing a pact with the devil (“All you need to do is to give me a signing in your own blood” – track 2, Dancing with Lucifer) before being introduced to the lady of the house: “My name is Cassandra” (track 3, Cassandra’s Mirror.  Pleased to meet you, Cassandra…).

Where poetry does threaten to break out, it’s quickly stamped out with a careful selection of flat-footed metaphors which stomp aimlessly around in increasingly small circles.  It’s rare for bands to come up with lyrics that simultaneously lack subtlety and clarity.  Perhaps, one day, Whyzdom’s ability to do so will be interpreted as artistic genius.  For the time being, though, they’re left presenting pale and disingenuous thematic husks; feelings bereft of emotion: danger without fear, loss without sorrow, betrayal without hate.  It’s not long before the lines begin to sag beneath the weight of their own turgid vacuum.  By track 7, The Wolves, we’re trapped in a nightmare universe of rubbish riddles.  I am in some strange, snowy world in which the light of moon “flickers”.  Where am I?  Apparently, it’s the place where it’s artistically defensible to describe wolves as “young and strong and full of rage/Ready to jump on your face”.  Twice.

Tottering beneath a tower of increasingly absurd clichés, not even the most blinkered of optimists could be blamed for dismissing Blind? as just another symphonic disaster drowning in its own bravado.  But that buzzing in your ears as the album plays itself out, that’s not the usual tinnitus of metal mediocrity: it’s the sound of your senses convulsing in guilty pleasure.  For, despite everything, Whyzdom have actually pulled something remarkable out of the bag – an overblown, undisciplined, and completely un-poetic symphonic metal album which can stand on its own merits.


Tempting as it is to dismiss it as an unlikely fluke, it’s an implausible explanation for well over an hour of music.  In reality, success rests on the strength of some remarkably astute musicianship.  If you’re a fan of the genre, you’ll no doubt be aware of the “turd-polishing” technique employed by bands who adorn tattered material in orchestral splendour and drapery to hide their own lack of invention.  Whyzdom have gone the full distance, lovingly fashioning their turd from 24-carrat gold.  The sound quality is, unanimously, superb, from crisp violin runs to crunching brass.  And it’s put to excellent use.  The rousing, rising symphonic harmonies in track 2, Dancing with Lucifer, sweep the music from its feet.  The intricate interplay of choral chanting and pirouetting strings which open track 4, The Road to Babylon, send it swirling upwards life a plume of purple smoke.  And the unwinding descent of strings at the beginning of track 6, The Spider, crawls over the skin like…well, like a spider.

Even when the music shouldn't work, it does.  A thick tangle of deep piano keys which almost suffocates itself in The Paper Princess is pulled through by the strength of the tones and the sheer audacity of its composition.  And the same might well be said of the finale, Cathedral of the Damned, in which a chaos of contrapunctal choirs descend on the music like flailing bats.  The same carefree flair is displayed in the other musical parts, most notably guitars, which pull out some truly mind-boggling solos, including a rollicking rock n’ roll number at the end of The Paper Princess and a fifteen-second jazz orgasm three tracks later, in Venom and Frustration.

Whyzdom’s real strength, however, is their ability to synthesise all of their finery into the very fabric of their musical material.  Their orchestras and choirs do not just shadow the metal instruments in tiring repetition, but drive the music forward with their own impatient impetus; as for those guitar solos, they represent the pinnacle of some nifty riffing which weaves itself around the deep strokes of strings and powerful brass blasts (see, in particular, track 2, Dancing with Lucifer).  This approach just about justifies the extraordinary length of songs, which are allowed to develop themes in harmonious unison at a considered and careful pace (the only aspect of the album, in fact, which could be described by these words).  It’s high praise indeed to say that songs never seem stretched or lengthy.  And the only outstanding criticism would be that, having thrown up fully ten epics, Whyzdom have nothing to top it off with in their final track, which is unable to further intensify the atmosphere.

In the end, Whyzdom seem to have pulled off the impossible, constructing a genuinely masterly record on a totally rotten formula.  Amongst a host of bands who have tried to crack the symphonic metal code, they are unique only in that they succeed in doing so.  There are loads of reasons why this album shouldn’t work.  By the end of the record, many of them are absurd to the point of embarrassment.  And yet, for all its pomp, pretension, and pimple-ridden immaturity, Blind? is enormously, massively, deafeningly entertaining.  If nothing else, the band should be congratulated on managing to write a record which is both the most outstanding miserable cliché and,  at the same time, the most ill-conceived masterpiece the genre may have ever witnessed.  Now that really is magic.

Production: 4/5
Lyrics: 1/5
Album cohesion: 4/5
Music: 8/10

Percentage score: 68%

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