Requiem: Mezzo Forte - Dark Publications

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Editorial Reviews:

Album Description
An Expansive, expressive journey... statuesque and monolithic...delicately etched upon a canvas of gothic and classical beauty.

Album Details
All Scores were Composed by London and Escarbe, and Performed by the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra. The Second of the Series, Requiem-mezzo Forte, Further Develops the Classical and Operatic Influences Within a More Identifiably 'metal' Framework. Combining Traditional Metal Instrumentation with Rich Orchestral Arrangements, Mezzo Forte Captures the Dramatic, Dark Melodic Sensibility that Virgin Black Fans have Come to Love and Respect. The Final Album of the Series, Requiem-fortissimo, is a Fierce Statement of Grief, and the Band's Heaviest Work Yet. Combining the Brutality of Death/Doom with an Unmistakable Sophistication and Majesty, Fortissimo Concludes the Series with a Display of Greater Savagery and Abandon. When the Complete Series is Played End-to-end, Listeners Will Be Treated to an Evolving Soundscape of Increasing Intensity. With a Total Duration of Over Two and a Half Hours, Requiem is a Unique Sonic Experience.

Customer Reviews: Read 8 more reviews...

5 out of 5 stars

Wow April 11, 2007
6 out of 6 found this review helpful

I have been listening to Virgin Black since they have come out. Sombre Romantic to me was one of the greatest "metal" albums that I have ever heard. I cannot tell yet but I think this album far exceeds even that. I think it is right up there with Nights in white satin from the Moody Blues( I know not metal). Except the whole album is just as impressive. By the way... This album contains not one song.. everything is a movement. An amazing masterwork. It's hard to believe that Rowan (singer) and Escarbe (guitar) wrote and composed this whole album!!! Keep that in mind!!!

Mezzo Forte in C minor.. It starts with this sort of heart clenching, throat choking beauty of a piece. Requiem Kyrie (which seems to be the theme of the whole album) is about as great a start off as any Dead Can Dance album. Powerful, moving, and EPIC!
It Gently glides into the next piece (one never really hears the transition) but this time the guitars crank in at about 1/3rd of the song. Upon first listen, goosebumps raced up an down my arms.. This piece is powerful. I feel a million emotions as Rowans growling blends with the distortion. Then His ever improving voice.. His singing is like that of a fallen angel. Whatever distortion there is, is played perfectly along with the violins.

The third song at first disapointed me. I mean, it was the heaviest song on Sombre Romantic (the first album) here to make a reprise. At first I thought the slower pace just didn't work. Then the ending came...... I realized how absolute and devastating this song really was. With the "death" choir I felt a doomsday sort of feeling.. Like that from the Exorcist. A power movement indeed....
Then come one of the gems ....and I am Suffering... this 12 minute piece is emotional as any song can get with out being retarted (see Yellow card for that one.) I almost wanted to cry. It was like Host of the seraphim, again Dead Can Dance, with guitars but entirely their own beast.

Just when you thought it couldn't get any better then comes Domine!!!!
The best song on the album.. Quite possibly the most epic and most doomsday-ish song ever recorded... with enough sweeping melodies and enough growling to appease Sisters of mercy fans and fans of metal.

The album then sort of reverses and slowly starts to simmer to a beautiful resting place.... Note the better singing and better drumming on the enire album.

This is when you open your eyes and blow out the candels....

2 out of 5 stars

Boooring... November 18, 2007
5 out of 7 found this review helpful

I'm sorry, but I just have to quote Nigel Tufnel here: "It's like, how much more black could this be? and the answer is none. None more black."
This is what happens when band's ambitions go unchecked by a presence of an outside producer. On Requiem mezzo-forte we see Virgin Black desperately striving to paint everything the blackest of black. Instead they manage to achieve something that I thought was impossible - recording an even more boring disk than their previous effort "Elegant... and Dying". Over the course of almost an hour the band is desperately trying to put the listener to sleep by means of tempos so slow, you could double them and still be under 100 bpm. That is supposed to convey the atmosphere of darkness and gloom, I presume. Too bad it doesn't.

Mind you, I'm a fan of dark music. Alice in Chains, Anathema, Opeth - these are all welcome guests in my CD player, and nobody can accuse these bands of playing happy music. But what they possess is the control over the dynamics. At some point Virgin Black had it too. Sombre Romantic was an excellent CD. It knew when to slow down, when to speed up, when to silence everything down to a whisper and when to crush the eardrums with an all-out guitar assault. In fact, it was the brilliance of Sombre Romantic that caused me to buy Requiem even though I thought Elegant was terrible. This is why it was particularly painful hearing them re-do "Midnight Hymn" and pretty much butchering it by slowing everything to a crawl and removing any heaviness from the song.

Is there anything good about Requiem? Yes, of course. The first track is pretty good and even has a catchy melody. Guitar tones are nice and crunchy (would have been even better if only they went somewhere beyond mere power chords). Rowan's vocals keep getting better and better. In short, it's not an utter failure. Furthermore, I'm still hoping that Requiem Fortissimo will return to the glory days of Sombre Romantic. All is lost but hope. But two stars is all I can give to this release.

In conclusion, I'd like to say: Rowan, Samantha, please, realize that guitar and cello have more than 2 lower strings. Tritone is not the only music interval. Minor chords are not the only chords in music. Whole and half notes can be further subdivided to form quarter, eighth and (gasp) sixteenth notes. And finally, darkness looks darkest when juxtaposed with the light.

5 out of 5 stars

Trilogy Likely to be Masterpiece April 18, 2007
4 out of 4 found this review helpful

I am a classical music enthusiast who also has a penchant for metal. In recent times I have been getting more into doom metal and gothic metal, and then there is Virgin Black, which really defies categorization--they combine elements of many kinds of music. And they are extremely ambitious and possess great songwriting ability, a most welcome combination.

This, the first release and middle section from a musical trilogy, is appropriately grand and morose. It is an almost even blend of orchestral and metal elements (with the Pianissimo album being mostly orchestral, and the Fortissimo being mostly metal). This is in my view their most mature and epic work, and is a clear outgrowth of their earlier albums, with the same passion but more skill.

The only notable flaw is the lead vocals, which have improved much since Sombre, but which are still not of the extremely high level demanded of for such an grandiloquent sound. However, this is a minor complaint and the earnestness and vocal effects of the singer more than compensates for some of the notes he can't quite get.

Highly recommended, either for fans of VB, metal fans with a taste for the grandiose, or classical fans who want to hear modern day masterpieces. Basically any music devotee will find much to praise in Mezzo Forte.

5 out of 5 stars

A Giant Step Forward for Virgin Black May 15, 2007
2 out of 2 found this review helpful

Having been a long-time fan of mournful musicians Virgin Black, I had highly anticipated any follow up to their brilliant Elegant... And Dying. When I heard they would be releasing a 3-part set featuring the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra, I was elated. Mezzo Forte is the second disc in the trilogy, featuring a healthy mix of orchestra and Virgin Black's typical stylings.

My first comment would be to mention the sound production, and hats off to Rowan London and Samantha Escarbe for pulling off such a full, rich and heavy soundscape. The orchestra comes through fully and clearly, the choirs sound powerful and beautiful, Rowan's singing has never sounded this good and the rest of the band is mixed in flawlessly. All of this creates a dark, heavy and powerful listening experience. Secondly, I have to mention that Rowan's growled vocals have come a long way in the past few years. Where he has previously sounded contrived or strained, he now sounds strong and deathy. And check out the "death choir" on a couple of the tracks here.

The songwriting is fantastic, and the CD flows smoothly from start to finish, each song a separate entity yet forming into a well-executed storyline when listened from beginning straight through to the end. Highlights for me are the mournful ...And I am Suffering (track 4) as well as the powerful and staccato Domine (track 5). There are no weak songs on Requiem: Mezzo Forte, every track plays wonderfully into the overall experience.

Highly recommended, and a vast improvement from a band who, I feel, have even more brilliance ahead.

5 out of 5 stars

***DETAILED REVIEW FOR AN AMAZING ALBUM*** June 5, 2007
2 out of 2 found this review helpful

First, if you dont know virgin black this is a quick genralisation of their music. It is extremely dark, not just the average crap "gothic" sound, but a genuine, original, creative darkness. it is untrue to say the music is depressing. Shape of Despair are depressing. Virgin Black have an element of beauty which is far more foregrounded then their dark sound. It is mournful, epic, majestic and beautiful. All these qualities come first.
their first two full length albums are far less orchestral then this album, they are a more traditional band format, although there is nothing traditional about their style. There style is well summarised in their own words..."comfort in darkness" if you like music which conveys either of these emotions BUY THIS
This album is a beautiful meeting of metal and orchestral music. Not in the cheesy fashion of many bands, or the film-score sound of nightwish etc.... the lyrics are also beautiful, more powerful and to be awed at, then dark and depressing lyrics. it is worth, i think, pointing out that virgin black are a christian band. Therefore the religious referances, and referances to death, darkness, misery etc.... avoid the typical cliches of metal, as they are tinged with a religious and beautiful hope.
I would suggest that this album is more orchestra/classical influanced then metal influanced. the metal aspects contribute to the epic sound..they are not the essence. imagine 'O Fortuna' with guitars, drums and classical vocals on it
It is a real orchestra. The vocals are absolutely beautiful, a mournful, classically trained vocal style, coupled with classical female vocals. However Rowan (male singe) can also do black metal screams and lower death metal vox. there is no black metal vox in this album (in fact, unlike their first 2 full lengths there is no black metal influance at all.)
Though there is lower death vocals occasionaly, there is also a choir frequently singing on this album (reminiscent of gregorian chant style vocal peices.) There is even a death metal vocal choir! This is the kind of shining example of originality that virgin black pull off.

INSTRUMENT LIST;
Orchestra (strings, brass, percussion)
Guitars
Drum kit
Vocals (male, female, death vox, choir, death vox choir)
piano

Another thing i love about this album is the inter-album references. ie. small phrases are repeated subtly throughout the album. This is a referance to how "classical" music develops its themes. This creates the effect that the album is one peice of music, rather then individual tracks. there is also a couple of referances to themes from their first album..done subtly of course. I love this attention to detail!

TRACKS

1) this is sort of the theme of this album, it is a meandering atmospheric peice centered around a refrain which is hugely epic.
2) the metal aspects are introduced here.
3) a track which features melodies from a track off their first album, but adapts them to the style of this album, there is also plenty of new material here. The majority of it is new. quite short compared to the rest. A bit of the serialist influance found on their second album here.
4) a beautiful track
5)Less orchestral parts here, death metal vocals are used in parts of this track
6) similar in tone to track 5, again, less orchestras parts.
7) quite short again. This takes the album full circle with the refrain from track 1. This time with added guitars to create a grand and epic closure to the album.

this is the second album in a series of 3. The first one is just orchestral and the third one is the heaviest music the band have ever recorded. So it is a large peice of music split into 3 discs.
This album was released first however due to the record company (the great "The End Records") wanting it to be so.

IN SHORT THIS ALBUM IS ABSOLURTELY AMAZING, HUGE RANGE OF INSTRUMENTS AND TEXTURES. ALL SONGS HAVE ORIGINAL UNCONVENTIONAL STRUCTURES, EVERY PART OF THE ALBUM IS PERFECT. IT IS ONE OF THOSE RARE ALBUMS THAT COULD NOT BE IMPROVED!!!!!

IF YOU ARE INTO METAL, DOOM, BLACK, FILMSCORE, CLASSICAL, GOTH, DEATH, NEOFOLK ETC..... OR YOU ARE GENUINLY INTERESTED IN MUSIC, YOU SHOULD LOVE THIS ALBUM. AN AMAZING BAND!!!!!!

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