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#FOR FANS OF: Dark Rock, Anathema, Klimt 1918 |
The Italian project En Declin is not a new band being founded in 1996
under the moniker My End. Later on, the project evolved and changed its
name to En Declin, releasing two different albums between 2005 and 2009.
As it usually happens, the line-up stability was the main problem for
these guys to continue improving and evolving its sound, as some members
came and left the band during a long period of time. In 2016, the three
remaining members, Andrea, Marco and Mauricio decided to continuing as a
trio in order to forge a renewed sound and release a new work, which
would mark a new beginning for En Declin. The result of this effort is
‘A Possible Human Drift Scenario’.
En Declin’s style
on this album is a more sophisticated and mature form of its previous
sound. ‘A Possible Human Drift Scenario’ navigates between the realms of
dark rock, melancholic pop and some noticeable progressive influences.
The band´s music is a vivid soundtrack of a dreamy journey, forged by
deep emotions as melancholy or the evocation of a long forgotten past.
Musically speaking ‘A Possible Human Drift Scenario’ recalls the softest
creations of bands like Katatonia or Anathema. Maurizio’s vocals are
delicate yet mournful with a very fragile and beautiful tone; his vocals
appear quite in the front of the mix, mainly alone, but also many times
doubling them and giving the effect of having several singers singing
at the same time, some nice examples would be the excellent ‘Caronte’ or
the also fine tune ‘Mr. Lamb’. As mentioned, this is not a particularly
heavy album, but a release more focused on being evocating. For this
reason, the guitars play an accompanying role of the vocals with
tastefully done melodies and chords with a strong prog nature, but being
closer to the pop style more than an actual rock band. The guitars
compositions like the necessary rhythmic base create structures with a
simple, but a interestingly evolving progression in the most inspired
compositions. A representative example of this is given by the longest
track of the album ‘Das Eismeer’, which is probably the most interesting
composition. These highlights improve the overall result because
sometimes these kinds of albums tend to be slightly monotonous, as one
may find some tracks particularly similar in its structure. Marco, who
is the guy behind the drums, tries to enrich the sound of this album
adding some atmospheric arrangements, like little electronics effects
which serve as a intro for some songs or as a background ambience. I
particularly like these adds as they reinforce the evocating nature of
this album.
Overall, ‘A Possible Human Drift
Scenario’ is a pleasant listen if you like these calm and slightly
gloomy albums, where the atmosphere is more important than the strength
of the compositions. It will obviously please those who enjoyed the
softest side of the aforementioned bands like Katatonia or of
particularly emotional projects like Klimt 1918. (Alain González Artola)