Customer Reviews

Catastrophe Ballet

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Catastrophe Ballet was my first Christian Death album and still remains one of my favorites. This era of Christian Death saw a move from the punk stylings of Only Theatre of Pain to a more produced pop/rock style, at times using Bowie-like musical structures. The music here is a bit more mainstream and easier to digest than the abstract experimentation that would define the band's next album, Ashes.

Those of you who are a bit timid about buying a Christian Death album might find this a good choice. The brilliant lyrics are a bit more subdued than on many of their other releases, taking a very poetic style that employs a lot of metaphor and imagery. The music here will also appeal to more mainstream audiences looking to find out more about Christian Death. Most of the songs are well-produced rock/pop songs with brilliant guitar, atmospheric keyboards, and driving drums. It's also a bit more upbeat than other Christian Death albums.

The end result is that this is one of Christian Death's best albums....beautiful, haunting, danceable, interesting, thought provoking, at times even radio-friendly, at other times experimental....thoroughly enjoyable from beginning to end.

My only complaint is with Cleopatra's reissue, which is flawed as usual. The CD won't play correctly in my portable CD player, and the album booklet is a sea of typos and misprints (the worst being that the spine of the CD is actually labeled with the incorrect CD title!) Don't let this stop you from buying the album, though.. The music is well worth it (as is the very artistic and interesting album cover that the label actually managed not to mess up)! This is definitely a must buy for anyone interested in goth rock, pop, art rock, or good music in general...

Turn out the lights, light some candles and insense cuddle with your dark lover and drift off into a gothic elizium. One of Rozz's best in every way. Beautiful, dark, gloomy, and utterly bittersweet. However it isn't really too different from Only Theater Of Pain. It's basically a bit more refined. Rozz actually sings instead of moans. And there is obvious musical proficiancy from the members of this lineup. Also the production is flawless. But it is in no way less powerful than the original Christian Death lineup. Definitely a quintessential gothic rock masterpiece.

If you by chance get the Cleopatara's remaster of this wonderful album, DON'T believe the liner notes " Words by Rozz Williams, all music by Valor "...Seven of the album's nine tracks were written by ROZZ WILLIAMS ALONE; " Sleepwalk written by Rozz and the original version ( on " Invocations " ) was recorded by the " Only Theatre Of Pain" line-up. But Valor does admittedly do a good job arranging and producing and his finest guitar work is here and on " Ashes "; Gitane DeMone's atmospherically religious keyboards and serene backround vocals are exqusite
( note: along with Rozz Williams, Gitane Demone is also a victim of the egotistical Valor Kand and reportedly still to this day is cheated out of her royalties by Kand ), David Glass's druming is excellent, and of course, the master of ceromonies rozz Williams' Bowie-esque vocal styling and beautiful haunting lyrics
help complete this great work. Too bad about Kand's ego and eventual succumb to commericalism...it effectively destroyed a really good band.

Kaenan James

R.I.P. rozz Williams, much continued luck to Gitane DeMone and David Glass in their current careers.

Upon hearing that Valor was re-releasing some of Christian Death's more popular releases, I was happy to get the digitized versions of the older classics. The first one just got delivered to me yesterday. It was the beautiful Catastrophe Ballet. It was said to contain an unreleased song by he and Rozz. I was skeptical, because he'd said that before, and it ended up being an old song by Rozz himself that had been recorded during the time he was working with Valor. The original music was removed (It had originally sounded like a scary version of the Perry Mason theme song, and was entitled Lullabye), and replaced by a new music track by Valor, entitled Infans Vexatio(tormented children). It still sounded great, so all was forgiven. So, the first thing I did was put it in my cd drive and play this new song. Again, it sounded great, but something was wrong with it. It took three listens to figure it out. The vocals sounded as though they were originally done as a spoken word! The original music was obviously removed, and replaced by what sounded like something that would have fit well on Valor's last cd. Not only that, but the vocals were noticably edited to fit the music, and Valor sang with the vocals to make the chorus sound more convincing. I felt raped. In fact, the chorus is "He wanted you beneath the word, raped, faced down".

If you listen to it loudly enough, You can hear Rozz cursing from the grave.

Still, I'm ashamed to say it's actually a really great song! They are still a great team, and the violation is again forgivable.

This is, by far, Christian Death's finest album. It displays their deepest industrial edged music along with their best darkly poetic lyrics. As a fan since Christian Death's beginning, many moons ago, my opinion is that if you never buy another Christian Death album...YOU NEED THIS ONE!

Through the mainstream, when most people hear the name Christian Death, the usual albums first thought of are only a theatre of pain or the iron mask. now dont get me wrong, both albums are awesome and probably some of the best goth/death rock around, but this album, catastrophe ballet, well i think it set a whole new standard for the band as well as rozz williams himself. in this album, you can hear certain elements which could of been found in his early 90s band shadow project all in all, a kick butt album that lets the !listener! aware that good music can withstand good passion.

STILL one of my favorite Christian Death Albums. Dreamy Melodies, Ghostly Vocals, So turn out the lights, Light your incence, And Enjoy!

The ideal time to listen to this album is late at night in a room full of candles and incense smoke. It's the most enjoyable, indulgent romantigoth album I've ever heard. It just makes you wanna get up and do swirly Siouxsie dances while wearing a black lace veil and throw dried red rose petals in the air.

"Catastrophe Ballet" è un capolavoro dei Christian Death ed il disco ha attraversato l'Atlantico, dagli Usa all'Italia, senza subire il benché minimo danno. Consiglio a tutti gli italiani di acquistarlo presso Amazon.com!

This album is arguably one of the best, if not the best, post-punk, goth albums of all time. Everything about it almost defies one's ability to communicate its beauty and power. The record is deeply philosophical in nature, themes of existentialism, nihilism, and the longing for a lost God who has long since turned his back on the world, run throughout; indeed, the record it generally latently nihilistic, but sometimes it's nihilism bursts forth with such grace and power as to render one almost paralyzed- not an album to listen to when friends are over for chit chat. This album is best experienced when you are alone, in a candlelit room.....