Islands

Last in a series that began with "Shores" and continued through "Streams", this is the darkest but not the strongest CoO album compared with those earlier recordings. This does sound similar to "Tree of Knowledge" which CoO also released in 2009 and I wonder if the two albums were recorded at about the same time. On "Islands" the band sounds as if the two musicians found themselves in some dank horrible place where just looking at the walls makes you feel depressed and you feel your optimism about life fast ebbing away. There is a strong echoing effect which completely overwhelms the singing at times and turns it into washes of blur behind the darkly jangling guitars. The rhythm section comes over as a deep and sinister rumbling presence. Fans of Livelover may recognise a similar dark urban blues vibe flowing through this album even though the two bands' styles are very different with Lifelover favouring a clean, melodic style that at least has flashes of humour whereas CoO prefer a dirty (I hesitate to say "grungy" in case some readers get the wrong idea) garage rock style.

The band's sound can be powerful and almost massive on tracks like "Somewhere Between the Planets" and "Flight of Lucifer". The vocals are garbled and the vocalist sounds like he's singing into a large megaphone inside a metal container that causes the sound vibrations to bounce around too much and interfere with each other. The best tracks on the album turn out to be the instrumentals "Sumusta", "Timbre Noir Pt. 4" and "Ajassa" which admittedly are repetitive and simple in structure but end up expressing more emotion and atmosphere than the songs do. They have a lighter touch as well which can't be said for a couple of tracks later in the album. "These Feathers in My Hand" starts off well with a riff that could have been written by Lifelover but then descends into a ham-fisted stab at plodding doom. The lethargy continues into "Somewhere in the Islands" which has blurry guitars which are the only part of the track I find agreeable.

The first half of the album is better than the second half. CoO just don't do serious doom very well and they should have limited the darkness to their sound, lyrics and production. Slow music usually points up weaknesses in the CoO vocalist's style, making him sound more out-of-tune than he usually does. The result is that "Islands" isn't quite the album it could have been to finish off the trilogy. Still, there are some good melodies and riffs in there, the band's sound does have a dark crystal beauty and the instrumental pieces can be deeply affecting in their own mute way.