Saviour

Antimatter | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (September 24, 2002)
• Original Release Date: 2002
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: The End Records
• ASIN: B00006JNE6
• In-Print Editions: Audio CD  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #289,881 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The beautiful darkness., October 31, 2002

By 

Lord Chimp (Monkey World) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Saviour (Audio CD)

Dark and sad. Those are the words of choice for describing _Saviour_. It just bleeds those senses out of every note. From the production's haunting echoes, the forlorn melancholy of the vocalists, lyrics of lost beauty, sorrow, loneliness.... not fun stuff, but it makes for a great album. So what is this stuff anyway? In case it matters, Antimatter is the project of Duncan Patterson and Michael Moss, the former having once been a member of Anathema. I can't really comment much on their background, but their somber inspiration on this album leaves a mark and has inspired me to look into their credentials some day.

Although Michael Moss sings parts of the songs "Over Your Shoulder" and "The Last Laugh", the vocal performances are largely handled by a pair of female vocalists, Michelle Richfield and Hayley Windsor. Both voices are lighter than air, crystalline and pure, pretty and delicate, and it's hard to imagine singers more perfectly fitting for the melancholy music of this release: dark, ambient pop with a haunting production that is all perfect clarity and harrowing echo. Richfield's voice is a little more robust, breathy, and sexier, while Windsor is almost elfin with her heavier accent and silky smooth quietness.

As I said, the music is basically just beautifully crafted, chilling dark pop. Sparse arrangements of percussion (electronic and acoustic), bass, and perhaps a keyboard and/or guitar leave lots of breathing room for the vocals, which are treated with an overlay of reverb to give the whole album's sound deep space and resonance. "Over Your Shoulder", "Angelic", and especially the sad "Flowers" are stunning songs among great songs. A pair of largely instrumental tracks attain levels of dark atmosphere and mood I've heard few accomplish. "God Is Coming" is a frightening smother of beats that is quite disturbing in the dark. "Going Nowhere" is the album's final cut (not including the bonus tracks), carrying the album off into the darkness with a minimalist four-note synth pattern, a ticking clock, and other harrowing textures that build and shift around these things.

I'm not sure who this is going to appeal to on a general level, since a lot of people who might like the style will never hear of _Saviour_ and those who hear of it might not like the style. Anathema fans? Maybe, heh - I have no idea. In either case, it is excellent music and I recommend it highly.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Dreamy, February 12, 2003

By 

IcemanJ (Ohio, USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Saviour (Audio CD)

The feel of the cd is dark, dreamy pop. Although it isn't Pop-ular like the name may suggest, it uses elements from pop music and makes them better. Texture is very spaced out, deep, and rich, but with a lot of melody and rhythm. Instrumentation certainly isn't intricate. Vocals are handled mostly by two female vocalists with very fitting, clear, light voices, with Mick Moss singing some parts too, and a duet going on between 2 of the three quite often. It seems like the whole cd is overlapped with an echo to make a soft, dream-like feeling. "Flowers" particularly feels the most dreamy to me. My favorite songs are "Over your Shoulder," "Angelic," and "The Last Laugh."

There are a lot of instrumental parts in songs. Most of the time just a soft melody with percussion. "God is Coming" is a barrage of scary electronic pulses. The last song, "Going Nowhere" is largely instrumental and if you listen carefully you can even hear a hint of melodies from a couple former Anathema songs. I don't know if that was intentional or not.

This version comes with 2 bonus tracks which are acoustic versions of songs on the CD. While Mike Moss' vocals aren't exactly the greatest, hearing the songs in acoustic "form" is very nice.

As for what kind of fans this will appeal to, who knows. It seems that it's not really advertised in the right place, such as metal sites and metal magazines. Even though Duncan Patterson is involved, this is drastically different from anything Anathema has ever done which was mostly doom metal and then emotional alternative rock, but I enjoy both Anathema and Antimatter.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Dark, dark, dark., January 11, 2004

By 

spiral_mind (Pennsylvania) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Saviour (Audio CD)

It's hard to simply describe an album such as this. It's too slow and spooky to be pop and too subdued to be rock; it's atmospheric but not psychedelic, and unquestionably dark but not quite gothic. I once tried to describe it to someone as "what Sarah McLachlan would sound like if she turned evil," but that doesn't quite sum it up either. Whatever you call it though - Saviour is a compelling experience. From the big cocoon of sound they build with washes of eerie synths to the spine-tingling female vocals throughout, it's a musical journey that's as gripping and enveloping as it is bleak and sad. The guitars alternate between fiery scorching and slow tones bordering on ambient minimalism. The keyboards build a marvelous world of ether to get lost in, and listening with headphones only opens the door to a whole new level of aural discovery. From the driving beats on the opening track to the subtle echoing clicks and taps on the slower songs, the rhythm is provided by a simple bed of electronic beats (there are no drums).

Antimatter is the project of two men, Duncan Patterson and Michael Moss (with two female sirens stepping in to provide almost all the voices), and though there's some good studio wizardry at work, it's the songs that make Saviour the wonderful album it is. Moss's more catchy subtle hooks make a wonderful complement to Patterson's songs, which overall are much more slow and moody (except perhaps for "God Is Coming," which erupts into an unexpected burst of techno thuds that's downright menacing). It's a balance that makes for a nicely effective flow to the whole thing, since the sonic textures and the scary mood are consistent through both their modes. The more slow-paced tunes ("Holocaust," "Flowers") may take a little longer to grow on the listener than, say, "The Last Laugh" or the darkly gorgeous "Over Your Shoulder" - which is definitely the disc's high point for me - but even through the less accessible moments, it's a solid 43 minutes without a weak point anywhere (not counting the two acoustic remakes that top everything off, which are just icing on the cake).

Give it a couple listens and Saviour should grab you at least at some points; give it a few more and it'll start revealing its depth and its textures a layer at a time. Give it a while longer than that and maybe the nightmares will stop too.