Corrupted - Garten Der Unbewusstheit

Second in my small list of backlogged reviews, this time I had picked up Corrupted's latest. Rereading this, I don't think it does justice to how good the album really is so I consider it a poorly achieved review. I also don't like the writing style, nowadays I'm more inclined towards something a little more technical and descriptive than this pseudo-poetic nonsense that I'm clearly not very good at. All filler is good filler I suppose, though.

Check out my previous backlog review here.

Corrupted - Garten Der Unbewusstheit (2011)

So after some phasing out I finally had myself listening to this album and let me say I was more than happy that I did.

Well, if by happy you mean stripped down of all hope and reason, screaming inside as each riff tore my soul apart limb from limb (o for all the limbs my soul possessed) and all that other cliché’d nonsense you usually get when listening to good doom. Yeah, happy in that sense at least.

But first, the basics: Corrupted are far from being strangers to the doom scene. They’re a Japanese band that more often than not sing in Spanish and are known for breaking the canon to a slight degree, bringing bagpipes and other folk elements to their music as well as a sense of “calmness” from times to times. All with a surprising coherence to it, not being one of those bands where they add things that don’t make sense and it’s your fault for “not getting it”.

…which brings me to this unpronounceable gem. Garten Der Unbewusstheit is a funeral doom masterpiece with delightful tones of atmospheric sludge that progresses slow but steadily into contemplative beauty. It starts out with a minimalist approach, teasing with slight tones and variances that set a great mood; it transforms itself acoustically while never failing to maintain the proper ambience; it explodes finally in destructive bliss, a catharsis you’d expect to witness at the end of the world.

Nevertheless, I wouldn’t say that it brings anything new – the melodies are your textbook doom riffs, the rhythm is as slow as you’d expect and the voice doesn’t really set itself apart from any other doom that you’d get. Its halfway song – Against The Darkest Days – is an interesting acoustic skit but again this is not novelty in the genre so if you’re expecting groundbreaking extravaganza you got your wrong pick.

However, if you’ve been craving your doom fix and like me think standard is pretty much awesome too, then I couldn’t recommend this enough. It is indeed a great album, both for chronic listeners and people new to the music genre.

Just get the damn thing already.