Muistumia

What Kauan are doing with Muistumia is never a good idea, but I have to give them credit where credit is due – it’s nothing short of a minor miracle that they managed to pull it off as well as they did. It’s hard to figure out what compels bands to think that going back and re-recording their classic material is a good idea. While most of the time I suspect it’s a pathetic cash-in, it’s just as plausible that the musicians just want to have some fun reliving the good ol’ days. While in the end the redundancy kind of makes this not entirely necessary, things could have ended up drastically worse.

There are two instances where re-recording can generally work out – when redoing demo material that had real potential but suffered from shoddy recording qualities and when a band completely changes their sound and wants to revisit some earlier songs in their new style (with the second one bands have to tread carefully, as it has potential for great disaster). However, Kauan chooses to go down neither of these roads. The early material they covered was fantastic, especially that found on their debut album. This being said, it really is astounding how well they pulled this off.

However, this is hardly a departure from the sound used on the original. Folk-imbued doom is still at the heart of the sound. There are some changes in the textures of the atmospheric instrumentation, and the ghastly, seasick violin sound is nothing short of hauntingly beautiful. Some of the keyboard textures, however, don’t exactly flourish in a metal environment. The sound is a bit more polished, which I can’t say I particularly like, but this definitely is the type of metal that can get away with sounding so slick.

In the end, while this is still quite enjoyable to listen to, redundancy does take its toll. Kauan's re-recordings are quite good, but what the hell is the point when they are so faithful to the originals? It’s not like minor divergences don’t happen, but it’s really to subtle to make a huge difference. The biggest improvement they could have made here is to replace the drum machine with the real thing, but one again it’s the same old just there mechanical ones. While undeniably a good listen, this is hardly wholly necessary. The originals are a tad better, and how could they expect to outshine the initial glory of a masterpiece like Lumikuuro? This is especially inexplicable since they had long abandoned their metal sound for a more post-rock oriented direction.

Originally written for the Metal Observer.