Customer Reviews

The End of the Wizard

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4 star:		(1)
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This album by Weltenbrand is their most recent release. It's actually the first release by them in nearly 5 years, and also the first on their new label, Napalm. I don't own any of their prior albums, so unfortunately I can't compare it to their previous work, but what I can tell you is that this is a finely crafted album.

Weltenbrand is a group from Liechtenstein, and what's really interesting about "The End of the Wizard" is that all the lyrics are based directly out of traditional folktales from the Lichtenstein area. This was a pleasant surprise for me, and for anyone who enjoys folk and fairy tales from various cultures. Many of the songs deal with the 'People of the Night', a sort of fairy or ghost-like race, which is conceptually much like the 'Good People' of Irish lore. Definitely not fairies in the most common sense of the word - rather an enigmatic race that basically exist on another plane most of the time, but can occasionally cross over into human affairs with results that are sometimes positive and sometimes chilling, yet always mysterious. Anyway, People of the Night, or "Das Nachtvolk" in German, was actually the name of one of Weltenbrand's earlier CDs, so I assume this is a theme that has continued through their various works. Most of the songs deal with medieval peasant life, always with a touch of the supernatural.

I suppose many people would think the lyrics trite if they just quickly read through them, but actually they're quite compelling because of the music behind it. The music is what really drives this album. The music would be considered darkwave, and it's very neo-classical. All the stringed instruments sound fantastic in combination with the rest of the music - there are also some subtle synthesizers and drums in the background. The way the music was assembled is wonderful - I would listen to this disc even if it were just an instrumental. It's quite dark, yet it doesn't sound sinister as tracks by a group like Dargaard often do. Though it's dark and somber in tone (most of the tales end with a death), it's very serene and relaxing at the same time.

My favorite track is "The Ghost of New Year's Eve," the reason being the wonderful female vocals that lead this track. My one complaint about this album is that they don't utilize these female vocals by Dina Zambelli nearly enough. She sings exclusively in the background except for two tracks (the other being "Overheard"). Ritchie Wenaweser is the male vocalist who leads all the other songs, and while I enjoy his voice for a while, it starts to grate on me after a while. He has a great voice and I believe he'd sound great in an opera, but his vocals are just so repetitive. He sounds almost the same on every song, which gets old by the time you listen to the album through. I realize what they're going for - his vocals are very dirge-like, and very somber, which theoretically fits this music perfectly. I just find that, in practice, his repetitive vocal style does more harm than good. It also doesn't help that after a while you start thinking Ritchie's vocals sound kind of cheesy the same way that Brad Roberts from Crash Test Dummies do, sounding almost froglike because they're trying so hard to sing as low and as full as possible.

When all is said and done, it's the male vocals that stop me from giving this 5-stars. The music itself is a quality production, the lyrics are intriguing and unique, and the female vocals are beautiful. But the repetitive sound of Ritchie's voice just doesn't do justice to the otherwise beautiful sound of "The End of the Wizard."