Entry 1442 - Tiamat - A Deeper Kind of Slumber

Style: atmospheric goth rock/metal

Primary Emotions/Themes: Daily life, romance, loss, introspection

Thoughts: There was something in the water in the late 90's for metal bands. So many bands that started out extreme either mellowed out or started experimenting in strange ways... or both. 

On one side of things you had many of the second wave black metal bands experimenting with electronics, odd ambient passages, clean vocals and sometimes just pure nonsense. On the death metal side you had a more mellow progression, slowly dropping the extreme vocals and eventually even the heavy riffs for a more rock oriented sound. This is the place that Tiamat found themselves in with A Deeper Kind of Slumber.

Most of the time when a band changes their style so completely it can go one of two ways. The first being an abject failure and the band abandons the path quickly. The second though is the more interesting case... this is where the band actually starts hitting their stride and creates music that is truly their own. The Gathering's progression to How To Measure a Planet? is a fine example of this... so is A Deeper Kind of Slumber.

Gone is any trace of extreme music. There are only clean vocals, the guitars are hardly distorted (when they are even there), the drums alternate between rock drums and what sounds like an electronic kit, there are numerous passages where it's only keyboards and Johan's soft voice (see The Desolate One). Tiamat now has much to do with metal as David Bowie does on this album. 

Now, in the hands of a lesser band this would all be a disaster, however this is not a lesser band. Tiamat has finally hit their stride. Wildhoney showed hints of this, but still clung to the extreme vocals and death metal at points in the album... this album finally breaks the chains that had been holding the band back. They are truly doing their own thing here with no regard for the bands past or expectations. 

The thirteen songs on A Deeper Kind of Slumber are like a fine wine. The further you get into the album the more it reveals all of its nuance to you. Popping the cork with Cold Seed, the band shows their new goth rock side right away. This is also by far the most active song on the album, after this things mellow out quite a bit.

The album goes through tons of melodies, instruments, and moods in the remainder of the playtime. By the time we get to Mount Marilyn and the title track the band has explored so many different ideas that the tasting notes list will be quite extensive.  

There are points where the band utilizes strings to compliment the guitars nicely (Atlantis as a Lover). A point where the music goes haywire and messes with the listeners brain (A Trillion Zillion Centipedes).  Many moments on the album are tranquil and quite morose (Mount Marilyn and the title track in particular). There are even a few moments where the band brings back the full distortion (Alteration X 10). It's a highly diverse album, yet it remains consistently good throughout.

I'll be honest here, outside of a few moments on Wildhoney Tiamat never interested me prior to this album. Clouds was nearly comical to me the way that clean vocals were introduced and I was never able to get into Sumerian City. A Deeper Kind of Slumber feels like the band finally figured out what they wanted to do, and that something was obviously not metal. In my estimation this is a very good thing, as this album is the first truly memorable one from the band.