The Nameless Disease

If there was something to be singled out in this otherwise unnoticeable album, it would be the lyrics. The whole work is conceived as a tribute to the band’s former drummer Frédéric Guillemot, who had committed suicide, and the texts, though rather simple, manage to sound both moving and thought-provoking without ever becoming whiny. Yes, every word here sounds so true, the guys really must have written this with their hearts. If only the music had been recorded the same way, this album could really have become another depressive masterpiece, all the more as one member of the band also plays in the extreme atmospheric doom act Monolithe. Unfortunately...

... unfortunately, after having listened to a couple of songs from this release, one soon understands there is very little to be expected. The Old Dead Tree’s music reminds me of the kind of “depressive rock” once great doom bands like Paradise Lost or Katatonia are now playing. More complex and a tad more aggressive maybe, but the core isn't very different. The vocals consist predominantly in whiny clean singing, and most of the time sound so pop-ish they are unlistenable, especially as soon as the singer hits the highest notes. Scarce growled parts show nothing exceptional as well, and while they’re nowhere near awful they still can’t redeem the horrible clean parts.

Now if one can survive the singing, the music doesn’t have really more to offer as well. As stated before, it stands somewhere on the border between metal and rock, closer to the metal side however, but that doesn’t imply any good. Punctual riffs are poorly written, not slow enough to do good crushing doom metal, but not fast enough to prevent the listener from yawning all along these eleven mellow songs. Don’t misunderstand me, this album isn’t in any way related to doom metal, and even calling this gothic metal is doing an offence to genuinely talented gothic/doom bands like Draconian or Type O Negative.

Indeed, as often when dealing with this kind of music, the guys also have a bad inclination for the so-called “progressive” side. As almost everything, this could be done in more or less good fashion; here it’s generally done wrong. Sleep-inducing acoustic passages displayed amongst the tracks, “complex” songs heading to nowhere – especially in the second half of the album, what ends up making every track completely undistinguishable – and, of course, the certainly unavoidable and awful bass solo (if you really need to check, at the beginning of the fourth track). Coming to the production, it is pretty clear, but adds nothing to the music.

I don’t say everything is utterly terrible here. The last track, The Bathroom Monologue, while not being a masterpiece by any mean, is still a decent semi-acoustic melodic rock song, and disseminated amongst the whole album you may manage to find some pleasant, but short, instrumental passages. What certainly doesn’t prevent this album from having been a complete waste of my money.

Well, guys, your poor friend must be rolling in his grave...

Highlights: none