Tief.Tiefer

Die apokalyptischen Reiter offered this double-album before they went on their current hiatus. This release tries to be a diverisfied compilation of the band's numerous facets and feels like a weird greatest hits release with new and old songs. The eleven new tunes on the first disc Tief represent the band's rock and metal side side while the second disc Tiefer is an experimental acoustic record with only two new tracks and seven re-arranged versions of old classics. The digibook offers an additional artbook with underwater pictures of the band members and different animals of the sea.

This double-record is overall a rather mixed bag with a few outstanding tunes, several solid but exchangeable tracks and a handful of fillers. One issue I have with this release are Fuchs' vocals. In certain songs, he pronounces syllables exaggeratedly and rolls the r as if he was trying to copy Rammstein's Till Lindemann. The most horrible example for this is probably the vapid piano ballad "Ein Vöglein" that focuses entirely on this horrid vocal efforts. Ironically, his pronunciation in other songs is satisfactory and natural as in the relaxed acoustic ballad "Die Zeit".

Another problem is the band's overambitious diversity. Usually I like when a band experiments a lot but Tief is lacking focus. The band wants to convince at playing numerous genres but often fails to succeed. The first disc offers everything from sinister industrial metal like the poignant opener "Freiheit, Gleichheit, Brüderlichkeit" over psychedelic alternative rock like the smooth "Ein leichtes Mädchen" to the gothic ballad with Neue Deutsche Härte inspiration "Es wird Nacht". Tracks like "Wir" even vary between alternative rock, industrial death metal and gothic rock in just three minutes and go everywhere and nowhere at the same time. These versatile tunes aren't bad on their own but rarely work in the context of this album.

The second disc Tiefer has a better flow due to its acoustic concept but is also quite controversial. This album reminds me a lot of Helloween's anniversary record Unarmed. Tiefer includes a few solid ideas like the danceable big band version of "Friede sei mit dir", the disturbing and elegiac arrangement of "Der Wahnsinn" that sounds like the soundtrack of an old black and white horror movie or the uplifting and highly commercial Schlager version of "Flieg, mein Herz" with dominant piano and string passages that is saved by a short jazzy middle part with vivid percussive elements. To be honest though, most of the reworked versions can't mess with the original tunes despite one or two exceptions. They are interesting to listen to for those who are familiar with the band's classics once or twice but that's it.

In the end, this double-album manages to be creative, diversified and entertaining and is worth to be rediscovered once or twice a year. On the other side, the band's lack of consistency is at times frustrating and the song writing is not as gripping as on some of the band's earlier outputs. This album includes awesome tunes like "Die Welt ist tief" and "Terra Nola", average tracks like "Was bleibt bin ich" and "Die Leidenschaft" and fillers like "Wo es dich gibt" and "Das Paradies" . My final verdict is that faithful collectors and open-minded new fans could give this release a try. Occasional fans, supporters of the band's early years or those who are expecting a powerful metal record should stay away from this.

"Geschwächte Reiter" that's what I felt after I listened to this album. Even if I love heavy metal and hard rock, that's not what I expected from this album. When you listen to the first song: "Freiheit Gleichheit Brüderlichkeit" you expect the whole album will maintain this level of "metalness" (even if this band writes 2 or 3 songs that no one expects on each album), but that's not the case, the album consists of mainly hard rock songs, some heavy metal songs and even alternative rock songs or something like that (even there's a song with nu-metal elements: "Die Welt ist tief").

But that doesn't make it a bad album, it's simply a hard rock album with some metal tracks, it contains very good music and lyrics. Obviously for many of their fans it would have been even better if this album had more metal elements rather than rock elements, because that's what "Die Apokalyptischen Reiter" are, a heavy/thrash/folk/death/black metal band. Anyway they have written many songs that have nothing to do with metal like: "Das Paradies" from "Have A Nice Trip", or "Lazy Day" from "Samurai".

In a general way, the album "Tief" has great songs with very good riffs (the solos not excellent though), incredible lyrics and of course that "catchiness" on almost every song. The drummer Sir G. faultless as always, even if some of the songs are too slow. The bass lines are ok but not as good as those from previous albums. Nevertheless, as a whole the album is brilliant, although if you are expecting something like "Riders on the storm" or "Moral & Wahnsinn" probably you won't like it. But if you enjoy music from talented musicians, then you will like it.

The music on this album is not so fast as on previous albums, the riffs are less powerfull, but they're still pretty good. The vocals are awesome, sometimes are they're soft, but most of the time they're very hard, and even you can hear growls on the song "Wir", even if this song it's not death metal. That's why this album is so special, many songs sound like classic heavy metal, but there are also some industrial, death, nu metal and even alternative rock influences, and as expected, the melodic parts perfmored by the keyboard player Dr. Pest. The same situation appears, you can't just put
the music into a single genre, that happens with every album from this band, and they're so different between each other.

The album "Tiefer" consists of acoustic versions of old songs and three new songs also acoustic. As a whole, it is a very enjoyable album, but clearly not for metal fans. This album make you know that you are listening to "Die Apokalyptischen Reiter" even if the songs are completely different than those from the past albums, because they never lose the style that defines them.

The album "Tiefer" is completely different than the album "Tief" because it contains acoustic songs, there's no What amazes me is that even playing those acoustic songs (with folk influences) this band mantains a dark vibe in some songs like "Der Wahnsinn" and "Terra Nola" which are songs from previous albums but obviously played as metal, they were not acoustic. They achieved making these songs sound completely different as they sounded before, and they still sound great.

Finally I'd like to say that, the only thing they sould keep an eye on, is the guitar solos because, as I stated, they're not as good as before. I give this double album a 90 because in general terms, it's an amazing album, the fact that its sound is softer than previous albums, doesn't make it bad at all, just different.

"Must hear" songs: "Freiheit Gleichheit Brüderlichkeit", "Wir" "Wo es dich gibt" and "Die Welt ist tief" from the album "Tief".
"Die Zeit", "Friede sei mit dir", "Der Wahnsinn" and "Terra Nola" from the album "Tiefer".