Darchon

 Darchon - The Stygian Black Beyond
Kunsthauch, 2015
Genre: Atmospheric Black Metal

1. Apeiron
2. Outer Darkness
3. Caldwell (NGC 5128) Centaurus A
4. Selene
5. Crossing the Celestial Path to Infinities and Beyond
6. Auslander Hostility
7. Into a Cosmic Solitude
8. Unseen Kingdom

Bonus: Cosmicism:
1. Cosmicism Pt. 1
2. Cosmicism Pt. 2


It has finally arrived, the debut full-length from Darchon! This release contains over an hour of music, so make sure you set aside some time to experience this journey. I was lucky enough to get the limited edition version of this which comes with a poster and bonus CD. This edition is limited to 100 hand-numbered copies and I have #2.  The regular edition is limited to 200 copies.  As with the split, this comes with an envelop with a different cover (above) than the CD itself. The regular CD is inside the envelop and comes in a beautiful multi-panel digipak. The bonus CD is just a CDr in a small plastic envelope, probably so they could fit everything in the main envelope.

Despite the fact that his is Darchon's debut album, some of the music is actually quite old. Much of it was actually written and recorded before the EP even came out. So, in terms of writing, the EP is the

most recently written material. Some of this material dates back to 2009/2010, which is around when the Split material was recorded as well. Given the stark influence by projects like Darkspace, Darchon has a bit of a different format to their album. They arrange the material in such away that it mostly alternates between Black Metal and Ambient tracks. Darchon's Ambient prowess is a step above some the main projects that follow in this regard. The integration of synth work at this level manages to elevate the overall compositions and add a layer of complexity into the mix that can feel a bit different. Unfortunately, and probably by design, the riffing is rather overly droning. In this area Darkspace and Paysage d'Hiver cannot be beaten, they bring such solid riffing to the table that it is tough to compete. Which is why I think Darchon is really trying to do something a little bit different in the grand scheme of things. This droning approach that is more in line with Ambient really works in Darchon's favor making a release that is more mesmerizing in some regards. It's great music to just zone out, because it doesn't overly grab your attention, so it has a more meditative quality. The closing track "Unseen Kingdom" is one of the most unique tracks from this brand of Black Metal. It crosses paths with Industrial quite a bit and reminds me a lot of the Mexican project Hocico. If Hocico played Black Metal, this is, probably, what it would sound like.

The bonus EP comes with two extra tracks on of which is another Black Metal song. There isn't much info about this in any of the packaging, so I'm not sure how old the tracks are. "Cosmicism Pt 1" fits very well into the overall aesthetic of the album and really just continues the themes we've heard before. "Pt. 2" though, is a very different ambient track. This is extremely in line with the Ambient sections Darkspace uses and it just feels way more threatening. Layered into the background is a lecture about Black Holes and with the static ambience makes it a really interesting piece. I almost wish these two tracks weren't only on here and instead made their way onto an album. The Ambient piece would be a great setup for an intro or an outro of an album.

In the end Darchon created quite an awesome debut as far as I'm concerned. I can see why people might not like it as much, despite the heavy Darkspace influence, I'm not sure a lot of people are interested in listening to this much Ambient in between each Black Metal track. I think it makes for an interesting experience and presentation, but I'm rarely in the mood to listen to both, so I find myself skipping the Ambient tracks and just delving into the Black Metal sections more often. I think that's the only major thing people would really have a problem with, or thinking this is very derivative of Darkspace, but it's really not. Darchon's journey and feel, while inspired by the likes of Paysage d'Hiver and Darkspace, do have a fairly different feel overall. So, I think Darchon is some relatively brilliant stuff and I'm interested to hear new music from this project for sure. Hopefully all the material he was sitting on is out now and he can march forward with writing new material.

Darchon - From Unknown Vastlands of Isolation and Death
Self Mutilation Services, 2014
Genre: Atmospheric Black Metal

1. From Unknown Vastlands of Isolation and Death
2. The Pleiadas












After a couple years Darchon return with two more tracks, only one of which is a Black Metal song. It's impressive how slow some people can work on material, but I guess he just wanted to throw something out into the world to show the project wasn't dead. "From Unknown Vastlands of Isolation and Death" reminds me a lot of what Darkspace does, but this feels like a lesser or a lighter version of that power house of a project. Darchon is clearly influenced by this kind of material, but Darchon also touches on a lot more various Black Metal inspiration throughout a lot of his writing. The vocals are a barely existent and very buried in the overall mix of the music. Vocally it's not that spectacular, so I can see why they would bury the vocals in the overall mix. "The Pleiadas" is an Ambient, mainly piano driven track and it's actually quite enjoyable. It has some extremely spacey qualities to it and really compliments the track name. When it comes to performances of this nature I would say Darchon is actually a far more talented composer than the likes of Darkspace, but Darchon does need a bit more work in the Black Metal department if they ever hope to truly compete with stronger projects of this nature. While the material on this EP may not stand out in the grand scheme of things, it's good to know Darchon is still around and I'm still looking forward to any music released in the future.

Battle Dagorath & Darchon & Lorn - Enshroudment of Astral Destiny
Kunsthauch, 2012
Genre: Atmospheric Black Metal

Battle Dagorath:
1. Echoes from the Ancient Skies
2. Warspirits of Annihilation
3. Nocturnal Elegy
Darchon:
4. Oceanus
5. Shadows from the Elder Chasm
6. Breath of Typhoeus
Lorn:
7. Vain Foreseen





Side Battle Dagorath: ...coming eventually...
Side Lorn: ...coming eventually...
Side Darchon:

The first stirrings of Darchon were found originally on myspace, but it doesn't seem like it was too long before they were able to produce a split with the likes of Battle Dagorath and Lorn. Darchon is a one man project from Greece and composes some extremely well made material. It seems Kunsthauch snapped him up real fast and has been producing some high quality physical releases ever since. This first release comes in an envelope with a beautifully designed digipak.

If you delve into Darchon and find yourself reminiscing about things like Darkspace you probably aren't too far off. Darchon is fairly similar in design and aesthetic to Darkspace. They even put to use some excellent synthesizer sections amidst their raging Black Metal. While Darchon's material is fairly long, it's nowhere near the level of song length that Darkspace reaches for. Despite the cosmic themes and synthesizers I think Darchon is more similar to Paysage d'Hiver in their overall sound. Like these projects Darchon sadly uses programmed drums. While they don't add much beyond a monotonous beat to the project, we're really hear for the overall atmosphere being generated. "Shadows from the Elder Chasm" actually has moments that remind me over early Emperor quite a bit, so hearing that blended in with the more modern take on Atmospheric Black Metal made for an interesting aspect that worked very well. "Breath of Typhoeus" is the shortest track and not a Black Metal song at all. Instead it's more of an Ambient type of track, but I actually which is was quite a bit longer like the actual Black Metal songs, because it really puts you in an impressive atmospheric space after listening to the other two songs.

Darchon have an impressive introduction to the world and this is absolutely a project I'll be following in the future. I really hope a full-length is forth coming, because a three way split isn't going to be enough for this project.

Gottlos

Gottlos - Infernal Pandemonia
Eclipse Productions, 2004
Genre: Black Metal

1. Glorious Conquest
2. Mystis
3. A Nocturnal Monologue
4. Kytheria (Astral in the Midnight)
5. The Witches of Symposium
6. Wrath of Katachthonium
7. Mesíášův Konec (Maniac Butcher cover)








Gottlos is another project somewhat related to Maniac Butcher that has probably been rather lost to the ages of time. I bought this CD around when it was first released and I think I listened to it once or twice back then and now we're in 2018 seeing if this holds up to the test of time. The music is composed by Greek musician Skylepthis and Barbarud Hrom from Maniac Butcher provided the vocal accompaniment.

Being related to Maniac Butcher I expect some degree of rawness and that's pretty much what we get with the first Gottlos release. The music isn't too bad, however, it is quite monotonous, which is probably the intention. Each songs has, perhaps, two to three riffs, if that. "Mystis" feels like it is only a single riff played for a few minutes. The major problem here is that while other bands like Gorgoroth and Horna have done a decent job with this approach Gottlos doesn't succeed in the same fashion. The riffing mostly feels okay with a few gems shining through here and there, such as the opening to "A Nocturnal Monologue" and there's even another riff in there that sounds quite good. The major problem and reason this winds up sounding so mind-numbing compared to other bands is there are no drum fills, except for one during the middle of "A Nocturnal Monologue". Skyleptis barely gives treatment to the rest of the drum set beyond snare, kick, and hi-hat. The beats rarely vary beyond a blast beat. The moments that do vary really stand out in a big way, because it's so weird amidst such over simplicity. The album closes with a Maniac Butcher cover and its a stark contrast because there are drum fills... so it's not that Skylepthis can't do them, he's choosing not to, which just make the overall release a bit more questionable in its drum arrangements. In fact, it almost seems like Skylepthis is learning drums as he is making this album, because the variation and complexity of the drum beats increases as the album progresses.

In the end, I'm not sure this was supposed to have more releases, but this wound up being a Black Metal one-off. While some of the riffing was enjoyable, the mind-numbing drum performance kind of killed the release for me. It really doesn't hold up well over time and I can't remember if I liked it a lot when it was first released. I can see why I forgot about the album over the years, because it didn't over enough memorable music for me to return to over and over. If you like incredibly simplistic Black Metal then you might find the lack of arrangements to be a feature.

Throne of Splendour

Throne of Splendour - Facing the New Dawn
Garazel Productions, 1999
Genre: Pagan Black Metal

1. Intro
2. Winds of Pride
3. Following the Eternal Voices
4. Facing the New Dawn












Throne of Splendour is a little known project out of Greece. The release of this tape on Garazel Productions is really what brought me to purchasing the tape, which is really just on the demo material level. This is also their second tape, I have missed out on the first and have, truly, no idea where I would even track it down. I will simply wait for someone to come along that wants to part with it. This tape, however, comes as a pro-printed double sided booklet with a dubbed tape.

Throne of Splendour is not your typical Black Metal project. It feels like they are sort of a slightly new take on the Graveland sound, to be honest. One of the major reasons this gets a Pagan Black Metal feel is because of its less conventional drumming approach. Rather than use a drum kit, they stick with traditional old world hand drums and a tambourine to keep the pace of the songs. The intro song and closing song "Facing the New Dawn" are simply clean guitar songs. They certainly create that cold and old atmosphere you would expect. "Winds of Pride" and "Following the "Eternal Voices" have distorted guitar lines that resemble the work of Rob Darken in many ways. They also feature the traditional harsh vocals of Black Metal. The music definitely has that epic and ancient feel to it, so in that regard they have certainly succeeded. One of the strange things related to this music is that it is very anti-Muslim or "Moslem" as they've written it in the booklet. I find this interesting, because this is a very early occurrence for that stand-point in Black Metal. It is only later that this stance becomes far more prominent in the genre, going beyond the more usual anti-Christian standpoints.

Overall this is pretty good and quite interesting material. So, if you've ever wanted a slightly different approach to the Graveland style this might be of interest to you. I think in later Graveland albums you would even see Darken including a lot of these elements in his music, so its tough to say who influenced who in some respects. Graveland is certainly the far more well known band in this case, hence the references. The musicians involved with Throne of Splendour seem to have stopped being involved in the music scene altogether though...

Tundra

Tundra - In Cold Dimness
Eclipse Productions, 2003
Genre: Black Metal

1. Intro
2. To Build a Reign
3. Total Human Collapse
4. Silent Fields
5. Christianity has Failed
6. In Cold Dimness










Tundra is a raw Black Metal band coming out of Italy. I think in the face of well produced Black Metal, Tundra are trying to take back some level of raw edge in the genre. I first found this project due to the large amount of splits they do, for me it was Inferno that led me to this project. I don't own the original 10" vinyl from Eclipse Productions, instead I own the repress on CD published by None More Black Records in 2006, which features the bonus track "In Cold Dimness." The original vinyl was limited to 350 copies and the CD version is limited to 1000.

I pretty much enjoyed the couple of tracks I heard from this band on splits, so I decided to pick up their entire catalog. I haven't given any of it a very deep listen, so this will be as if I experienced it all as it was originally released. "In Cold Dimness" is decently well recorded first effort. The production is raw and harsh, but this is probably intentional. Around this time Black Metal bands have started converting to using triggered drums and having fairly slick production, which I don't mind too much if the music is still good. A lot of bands, however, really dislike this and want things to stay in the harsh domain. For me I like both approaches as long as the music is well written and I must say Tundra is fairly well written music. As with all new bands forming with all the well written music in existence already it's hard to keep this consistent. The slower parts, like in the song "Total Human Collapse" I found to be fairly boring. On the other hand, I found all their faster stuff to be fairly well done and I actually quite enjoyed "To Build a Reign". Tundra do manage to capture that intense and primitive atmosphere of the early stages of Black Metal. The bonus track "In Cold Dimness" is a slow plodding instrumental and acts as a relatively decent outro to the demo. I don't know when the song was recorded, but the quality is basically the same level as all the other material.

While this debut didn't capture my ears every second it was on, there are riffs in "Christianity has Failed" that really stand out and I thought were quite good. This is one of those situations where I hope the band trend towards their stronger aspects in the future. I hope to hear what this band does in their future because it seems like they have a fairly solid foundation with only a little bit of tweaking necessary.

Naer Mataron

Naer Mataron - Up from the Ashes
Black Lotus Records, 1998
Genre: Black Metal

1. The Chosen Son
2. Faethon
3. Zephyrous
4. Τα Εν Ελευσινι Μυστιρια
5. Zeus (Wrath of the Gods)
6. The Silent Kingdom of Hades
7. The Great God Pan

This is the debut album by Naer Mataron from the small Greek scene that I knew of at the time this was released.  Naer Mataron do take a relatively interesting approach to their music, sadly it is restricted only to their lyrical concepts.  The album is slightly deceiving, in a way, with it’s opening track “The Chosen Son,” because it has a distinctively Thrash Metal feel to it, but that only lasts for four measures when it kicks into the more traditional Black Metal arrangements.  Essentially as far as this album is concerned it does not have any ground breaking work even for its release year, but it is a good album to listen to.  I cannot say I would pull it out frequently and listen to it, but it does show that this band has a definite degree of potential.  For the most part the album has a little bit of Black Metal for everyone, they use keyboards at points, but it is not used that often, maybe one riff per song on average.  There are some very well done melodic parts and the song that the band put together best on this album is definitely “Zeus (Wrath of the Gods),” it has an excellent chorus section of the song that couples with the melodic guitar line under the vocals.  I thought that is where they really shined on this album, the other songs are good, but none of them has a riffing approach that is as memorable as this song did.  The one production complaint I have on this is that the vocals seemed to be a bit low in the mix, but what do you expect for a debut album, usually these are the lowest budget of all the releases.  (Interesting note, one the producers of this album was Necromantia.)

Lyrically this band has a slightly different approach.  Being from Greece they chose Greek Mythology as their focal point.  I think it’s a great maneuver, since, for some reason, a lot of the bands from other countries outside of Scandinavia don’t really focus on the mythology of their homeland.  Which I think is very strange because one would think that the Scandinavians would set the trend that singing about your country’s ancient deities is a good idea.  Or maybe out of the hundreds of bands I’ve heard, I just manage to find the ones who don’t sing about that particular topic.  Greek Mythology unfortunately is not my strong point, so these lyrics did not hold all that much meaning to me, but if you are a Mythology buff and like Greece, then I highly recommend you look into this band for you will find it a more worthwhile purchase than even I did.

For the most part this album is traditional Black Metal through and through, except for the track “Τα Εν Ελευσινι Μυστιρια,” which is an instrumental and more of a relaxing track that focuses on atmosphere and has no metal at all in it.  The worst track for me was the last track “The Great God Pan,” because the vocal layering attempts were not very desirable.  For example, the vocalist will sing in a Death Metal voice the lines of the song “From the Arcadian Forest,” but layered under that is a higher-ranged Black Metal voice which comes in and yells “Forest!”  At first these things overlap a little and sounds fairly decent and is a very common layering approach, but then they start to spread apart more and get a little too sloppy for my tastes.  Until towards the end of the song the word “Forest” for example isn’t even attached to the original line anymore and is just sung separately.  It sounds rather out of place not the best thing to close with if you ask me.

Fans of traditional Black Metal will without a doubt enjoy this album very much; the production isn’t so poor that you can’t figure out what is going on.  In fact I found the production to be quite well done except for the vocal volume on the first few songs.  So for a rather unique lyrical approach this is a great band to delve into, I would say watch for further releases because as far as I can tell they have the potential to put together some really great stuff.  A lot of the guitar lines have very majestic approaches to them so it sounds really nice in the great scheme of things.  The debut album is always a strange occurrence in a bands life.  It is either the best work they have ever done and will never be able to top it, or it is just a somewhat decent album and the band pulls it together later.  I have not seen many bands get worse after their first album, but I am sure they’re out there.  Anyway, this is certainly worth a listen.

End

End - III
Black Hate Productions, 2009
Genre: Black Metal

1. Catastrophe
2. Self-Eating Mass
3. Still in Flesh
4. In the Womb of Sick
5. Lavish Gloom
6. Ugly and Bygone
7. The Largest Hearse
8. Megalomania






What seemed to start off as a promising new and productive project seemed to have stalled out for years. After six years wondering if a "III" would ever exist, the band finally returns with their best release in my opinion. Artistically this is certainly their most ambitious. It comes as a beautiful digi-pak with a full booklet featuring art and lyrics. It's a really well thought out product in this regard.

"III" starts off with a punishingly fast opening song with "Catastrophe" and I would have been fine if the album basically progressed in this fashion. End write well enough to make the blistering fast paced style pretty interesting to listen to... but when we get to "Self-eating Mass" we are in for a real treat. Not only does the riffing emulate some styles of early Keep of Kalessin to me, but the song eventually hits a lull and then we are in some very dark and brooding slow passages. It turns out this album has a huge amount to offer and is actually a very varied album. Its almost incredible to look at the grand scope of the album and realize they really made this kind of variation work to their advantage. Every track feels like it absolutely belongs with the rest. When they hit "In the Womb of Sick" you really feel like they're channeling Deathspell Omega. The off-putting guitar line feels reminiscent of the likes of "Diabolus Absconditus." This album really is a monster of a release and has a lot of extremely stellar moments. While none of the single pieces are original, I think the blend that is executed on here is very different. Similar to what Rêx Mündi's "IHVH" attempts to be as well.

If you had to ask me about this album at the time of 2009 when I first got, I would mention it as a very well done album. The recording quality, the layout, the delivery, everything is top notch. The songs are all solid and very good to listen to. But after a few years where does this album stand? For me, it certainly holds up over the years as a spectacular performance. However, I think "III" is an album that is much more meaningful in the context of its release, which I'm not sure I really saw initially. Today, I feel like this album really encompasses the state of Black Metal at the time. It really seeks to distill the influences of the prior few years into a single release. The period I'm discussing is primarily the rise of the French scene from about 2003 to 2008 or so. France's Black Metal scene, although always present, imply exploded and people couldn't get enough. Meanwhile we also saw the return of bands like Keep of Kalessin, which made a lot of people remember their early releases, which are quite exceptional. So, "III" blends this early epic Norwegian style into France's Black Metal and really gives us an excellent epilogue to a particular chapter in Black Metal's life. That's how I would see this album now, at any rate. It is certainly of the highest quality and in that regard I find it hard to believe Black Metal fans wouldn't appreciate this on many levels. I think in the context of a celebration of the scene of that era, this album would stand out a lot more... unfortunately End's intermittent release timing makes it hard for them to stand out in the scene. However, people are listening and hoping for more in the future. This release is truly a monumental undertaking and a wonderful journey... hopefully this is not the end of the project. If it is though, what a high note to close with.

End - II
ISO666 Releases, 2003
Genre: Black Metal

1. Dying Demon
2. Funeral Pyre
3. Defalcation of Psychopathia
4. Solus Pro Incendio Vitae
5. Winterfog
6. Damned Forest
7. Nebula
8. Pierced Genitalia (Carpathian Forest Cover)







After a short wait End has returned with their second opus.  Strangely this release is far more mature in just about everything.  The cover has the same basic simplistic idea, but at least the logo is printed over a forest background.  Upon opening the booklet even the paper is of a different quality, it's a heavy sort of card-stock that has a textured feel to it.  While this gives the album a different aesthetic, it makes for difficult reading if you wanted to get through the lyrics.  At least it looks very pretty and clearly exudes a wonderfully dark feeling.

This is pretty much how the music fits in as well.  For the most part the tracks are quite epic and not just in length, but also in sound.  The only track that throws back to basic Black Metal is "Funeral Pyre", which has a very simplistic rhythm and a very raw feel.  This slows the pace down a bit after "Dying Demon", which is fast and very raging for the majority of the song.  My favorite song on here is "Solus Pro Incendio Vitae" and it doesn't seem to fit with the rest of the album as well.  This is fine because it gives the album variety and really shows how well End can compose a song.  It sort of reminds me of the kind things Horna does very well.

One thing that does seem to get annoying is that every song seems to start with turning the guitars on and hearing feedback.  Sure, some songs can start that way... but most of these songs do!  The only ones that don't are these beautiful acoustic interludes like "Winterfog" and "Nebula".  I wish they had dispersed them around the album more, but oh well.  They are beautiful songs nonetheless.

The album closes with a Carpathian Forest cover.  They do a great job on this and I really liked listening to it, but since the acoustic tracks aren't dispersed well it gives the second half of the album an "acoustic" then "metal" iterated feel.  Overall I thought this album was very well done.  It's better than the first and if you liked the first I can't imagine you would hate this.  The writing is just so much better.  Despite the album having varied styles of Black Metal, I still felt like they stayed true to a cohesive atmosphere throughout.

Unfortunately I could not find a sample of "Solus Pro Incendio Vitae" on youtube, so you will just have to hear "Dying Demon" instead.  I apologize.  If anyone out there reads this and wants to make a video for that song, please do and let me know!

End - I
ISO666 Releases, 2002
Genre: Black Metal

1. Sick
2. Pitiless Paranormal Reek
3. Nails and Forests
4. Humanitarianism
5. Come Blackness Feed Me
6. Pessimism

This was initially a fairly random purchase on my behalf, mainly because I thought the cover was interesting.  I’m not sure why I found it interesting, there’s only a band logo and the album is titled “I,” which is probably one of the things I found intriguing.  They seemed to be overly simplified.  Regardless they were also on a record label that I know has released fairly good material, so I decided to give this a shot.  All the descriptions I saw for this band referenced them to being like Carpathian Forest and Darkthrone, so needless to say I wasn’t expecting anything amazing or impressive, but possibly some fairly decent Black Metal at the very least.

I wouldn’t go so far as to say I was immensely shocked or blown away from what I was subjected to, but I was pleasantly surprised.  What I thought would be another rather blasé Black Metal band turned out to have a little more to them than that.  The descriptions aren’t entirely wrong because I do hear Carpathian Forest and Darkthrone influence in this band, especially on a track like “Humanitarianism.”  However, the epic track “Nails and Forests” reminds me more of a blend of Naer Mataron’s “Skotos Aenaon” and Bathory’s “Blood Fire Death.”  So basically this isn’t just one uniform band playing six songs in the same vein, they actually switch it up.  There’s also an interesting more intangible atmosphere to their music that separates them from the likes of the Norwegian scene.  I can’t describe this in full, but I have a feeling it’s a Greek thing, I hear the same underlying epic styled feel in bands like Nocternity, Naer Mataron, and Macabre Omen.  It must be a Hellenic Black Metal thing, because you don’t hear this specific kind of epic feel in other regions.  No, I’m not saying you only have epic feeling Black Metal in Greek Black Metal, you hear it elsewhere, and this is just a specific brand of that feeling.  End does fall into the trappings of generic Black Metal from time to time, as you can hear on “Humanitarianism” and some riffing on “Come Blackness Feed Me,” but it is not so overwhelmingly generic that it takes away from the uniqueness and feel of their music.  Though if you notice the closing of the album “Pessimism” it is a very Naer Mataron styled outro.

Lyrically “I” is primarily misanthropic, favoring the ideologies that humans are parasites and genocide would be our saving grace.  “Nails and Forests” takes on a more nature oriented approach to things, which I suppose is good, because it switches things and doesn’t dwell on one topic.  Although, I happen to enjoy a misanthropic approach rather than a Mother Nature approach to lyrics.  Either way, the lyrical content is pretty usual until you hit “Humanitarianism,” which I think is primarily a satirical song.  Unfortunately the lyrical content for “Humanitarianism” is stupid, to be blunt.  Musically the song sounds like traditional Black Metal worship, back to some of the more Punk oriented roots of Black Metal before it really started to sever that tie over the years.  So that fits the lyrical content at least.  I suppose they knew what they were doing in the end.  I guess it just sort of sticks out given the rest of the lyrical prose.

Overall this was a descent listen.  I happen to pull it out enough to know that even months after I’ve purchased the album I’ll still pull this out to enjoy and that’s a good sign for any album.  Some albums I get are good, but then after a few months you lose interest in them, “I” managed to keep my interest enough with its atmosphere that I want to hear it more than a few times.