Sigh - Scenario IV: Dread Dreams
This album is largely an experimental facade masking a musical core composed primarily of mediocre heavy metal guitar riffs with monotone black metal vocals. While Sigh could have brought together all of the ornamental aspects of the music to make a quality album, what we have here is just far too incoherent. Certain elements seem to have been added as an afterthought. Take for example the piano outro on “Diabolic Suicide” or the intro of the following song “Infernal Cries.”
Primarily the problem lies with the guitar work. With one notable exception, the guitar riffs are very forgettable. Unfortunately, these riffs also act as the heart of the album. The framework is mostly tired, old, and all too familiar power chord progressions. No amount of clever instrumentation, random interludes, or suicidal chants can construct an excellent album with such a weak core. Additionally, the guitar solos mirror the main guitar work. Far too many times the listener is subjected to really trashy pentatonic noodling.
The one notable guitar exception to the boring guitars you ask? Have a listen to the riff at about 5:20 into “Iconoclasm in the 4th Desert.” Over that galloping triplet filled riff, vocalist Mr. Mirai Kawashima finally sings with some rhythmic and dynamic flair. He belts out a triumphant and hateful “You deserve the soul desert.” Circus elements act only as a reinforcing background and acoustic guitar strumming provides an additional glue. Interestingly, Mr. Kawashima does everything on the album except for the guitars and drums. Seeing how the drums are as lackluster as the guitars it takes little effort to see the source of Sigh’s creative elements.
Mr. Kawashima’s flat monotonous black metal styled vocals act as a glue to help hold the otherwise schizophrenic album together. However, the raw rasp is really unsuitable for the circus. Times of random revelry require something a little less abrasive and a little more dynamic. The harsh vocals sound honed in, as if coming from a rhetoritician’s rehearsed harangue impersonating a metal vocalist. The female vocals and clean male vocals on the other hand are solidly performed and more much appropriate for the music.
As shown above, Dread Dreams is not entirely bad. At times the whimsical randomness of the songs creates fairly enjoyable moments in the same way that all the nonsense at a carnival or a circus can be momentarily entertaining. This kind of circus-metal sound is a common problem that should be familiar to anyone who listens to experimental metal bands. With a large supply of creativity, Sigh, like others before them, end up highlighting a weak attention span that would go unnoticed in more musically conservative bands.
Another example of why the album is salvageable is the song “Severed Ways.” Opening with baroque sounding harpsichord noodling, the song quickly moves to the best use of Sigh’s guitar tone and song structuring. In a recurring riff, the synth kicks in over a somber guitar, a soft choir, and rolling bass, culminating in spectacular show of what Sigh is capable of. By pulling back the jarring insanity, Sigh temporarily asserts a bold atmosphere. In the song’s apogee, we have a solo that is executed so well that the listener can almost forget how close it strides to rehashing stock pentatonic noodling. Of course Sigh’s attention span at this point is stretched beyond repair, so the song ends with a happy fanfare followed by sad piano work.
If “Dread Dreams” is like an Alztheimer’s patient meandering out of the house at night, then “Severed Ways” is that rare occasion when the patient gallantly returns home in a lucid moment. The guitar solo is the scene when the patient walks through the door to greet loved ones he had not remembered for years. Unfortunately this moment passes and the rest of the album is more like Alztheimer’s.
In the first few listens of “Dread Dreams,” you are rewarded with novelty. A wide array of instruments and samples litter the album, again see “Diabolic Suicide” for metal riffs punctuated with cheesy triumphant 80s sounding brass. We even get organ, piano, choir, assorted synths, sirens, and even wind sample. After a while though, these elements become tiresome and gimmicky ornaments for music that is often boring.
In the end we have a prime example of the carnival/circus metal problem - more ideas than the artist can present in an effective way so the listener is just left with the sensation they are supposed to oooo and ahhhh at all the nonsense going on. The radical transitions from one idea to the next interrupt Sigh’s momentary glimpses of beauty, making the album a frustrating listen.
