Nightbreed of Macabria

What first struck me about Theatres des Vampires (TDV) was their incredibly atmospheric sound and appealing imagery which surrounds the band members and their choice of artwork. TDV have always used much orchestration and effects in their music to bring accross a gothic horror film feel to their music and this album certainly contains the most diverse use of effects and varying styles to achieve this end.

At first I was a little apprehensive of buying this album after hearing the downloads available on their website - the vocals sounded more like Till Lindemann from Rammstein than Alexander's usual screeching style. However, I was not to be disappointed.

"Luciferia" is an amazing track, and soon grew on me. It has a slow, catchy chorus riff, and the organ effect in the background really does work. The song is simple and sticks to a straightforward approach. Although not released as one (at time of writing this review), you could call this the single of the album) - it presses all the right buttons both musically and atmospherically. You will notice with a lot of TDV songs they know how to effectively use subtle musical effects to enhance their songs, proving they are not a joke, and this is one fine example.

Another favourite is "Angel of Lust" which is quite catchy and has more of a rock-based chorus. This begins with a great twinkling keyboard effect followed by soft vocals and builds up and up throughout the song, and Alexander really belts it out in the chorus (perhaps showing his range!). He duets quite frequently with Scarlett in this song and it really goes together nicely. It is a shame he left after this album.

My other favcourite is "The Curse of Headless Christ" which is probably what I would call the ballad of the album. It is slow and melodic, using clever guitar effects at just the right moment to add to the gothic soundscape. There is also good use of staccato string effects as it fades out.

The album does have its fair share of instrumentals and tracks focussing entirely on effects, such as the two "Incubo" tracks and the intro "Welcome to Macabria". Musically pointless, but atmospherically essential, these tracks only feed the album's description of "a musical travelogue through a beautiful yet unspeakably grotesque realm of the imagination, that owes something to the cinematic vision of Gothic director par excellence Tim Burton." (taken from the TDV website). Burton's love of a background gothic choir is highly evident through the use of Scarlett's vocals, and Fabian, as always, has pulled no punches with his orchestraic effects.

The final track, "La Danse 'Macabria' du Vampire [Horror Club Remix Feat. Radamantis - SixSexSix]", is a remix of a track from Suicide Vampire album, and due to the repetitive and catchy synthesizer during the verse, this actually works well as a dance track, I hate to say!

At the start of writing this review I had given this album a score of 75%, but after listening to it whilst writing I've upped it to an 80%, as although not a perfect album (there are no real amazing blinders on here), the album overall is clever and effective at achieving their gothic horror sound. As the band are Italian, their English isn't perfect, especially when singing in a genre reknown for its complex syntax and lavish use of words, but this album is a damn good piece of work.