After a long and procrastinated delay, Apoteg's self-titled debut has finally been rounded up and readied for release. During the making of this album Apoteg has ventured deeper into the inexplicable realms of noise and ambient which did produce a lot of material, but drove him too far from his original goal, to mix accessible industrial beat influences with less obvious and harsher genres like drone, noise and dark ambient. While they all eventually went hand-in-hand during the writing process, a special type of inspiration came from the deathly slow rhythms and anti-melodies found in funeral metal. While it will not appear constantly in all tracks, Apoteg has attempted to recreate this 'funeral' feeling in a prominently electronic manner. And even though guitars are included in some tracks, it's not the main focus or lead instrument of the music. The album closes off with 3 tracks clocking over 10 minutes, containing elements of material written that was unsuitable for this release but will appear separately in the future. These 3 tracks are just an indication of things to come
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Reviewer:Atrified - - August 11, 2008 Subject: Apoteg's debut album, self titled "Apoteg". First of all, I must say the production sounds great. No unnecessary or unintended clipping (of course there's plenty of clipping, but naturally it's almost always intended in this genre). The funny mix of dark beats, extravagant, deformed synths and distorted guitars can easily make one slip off in a dreamy, trance-like state - I occasionally found myself pleseantly surprised when I noticed I wasn't really listening to the music anymore, but just sitting in my chair in a total absent and relaxed state, letting the drones beat in on my brain through my headphones.
Apoteg's main inspirational and influentual source was the evil entity named "Giygas" - google it, if you want to know what I'm talking about - which is also quite very noticable on this album. To accomplish this, Apoteg used a huge variety of techniques and synths (which aren't always deformed) and as said before, also utilized an electric guitar on some of his tracks. The last subject is mostly used to focus on feedback and/or creating disharmonious and unnatural sounds, which in my opinion, works just perfectly on each and every track of this album.
One of the most prominent features of this album is definetely the always oppressing feeling that something is awfully wrong, that doom is near, but one cannot quite place what it is or when it strikes. Yet, in some tracks, Apoteg's unique soundwaves have the funny side-effect of letting you slip into a (as mentioned before) pleasant, relaxed state. This is definetely something to listen to for if you're going on a long trip of some sorts. Time passes quickly while listening to Apoteg, mainly because of the intriguing structure and the length of his tracks. Something which I also love to hear and which therefore pleased me a lot about this little set of tracks, is the fact they kinda' "flow over" into one another. For instance, at the end of "Maelström" there's this kind-to-the-ears ambient part, then you suddenly hear this distant/muffled echo of a mean drone, and fifteen seconds later your ears get smashed by this viciously distorted harmonic on an electric guitar in "Demi". The ammount of distortion Apoteg utilized must've been enormous. The feedback carries the harmonics off for almost thirty seconds at a time. Hey, I might as well write a short description of each song while I'm at it. I'll try not to give away too much of the structure until you finally hear it yourself. If you want to be surprised, then quickly skip along after the final note.
I was thinking of adding this last little note at the very bottom of the review, but since you'd have to scroll through the description of the tracks, that might not be so handy. Anyway, well done Apoteg. You've managed to amaze me once again. It still remains a mistery to me how you extract so much inspiration and ideas from a single, huge source. They say reviewers should remain neutral and indifferent regarding artists and comparing them with others. Well, that doesn't count for me. I bet them "hypnotic" tracks drove me to this, hehe. I'm sure I'll be listening to this for quite some time when I'm on the train or on the road.
01 Creation - couldn't have picked a better intro for a noise/ambient album. This track starts out gently, but that doesn't mean it's any less dark than the rest of the tracks. A faint, distant melody can be heard occasionally, and if you're one of the observing listeners you'll be pleasantly surprised a couple songs later on in the album.
02 Sangre - Sangre starts with some wicked sorta' gong incarnation, and after a short breakdown which was excellently placed - and to be very honest, caused a few shivers down my spine - the track picks up in a moderately fast paced beat. This track is not that heavy on the ears (except for maybe a bit later into the song) yet, but it sure as hell makes lots of promises of the not so distant, more heavy tracks. Sangre ends with a quiet ambient part, which later evolves into the forebode of a hurricane, whereafter calming down to introduce
03 Maelström - without a doubt one of the jewels upon this album. All tracks are great, honestly said. But this track really "jumps out" among 'em and is still my favorite of this entire album. It's not just the catchy intro tune, or the magnificent, unexpected transition from Sangre which makes me say that. It's the entire composition. This is one of Apoteg's first tracks. It's the second track he ever created after "6" (correct me if I'm wrong). I'm not going to tell you anything about this song's structure. Except for the ending, which I mentioned earlier.
04 Demi - starts off with a vicious harmonic and drags you into a grotesque world which surely promises obscurities to come which you've probably never seen or heard before in your life. Dragging you down ever deeper into the extravagant abyss of Apoteg, this track suddenly grinds you to a halt in a calmer section, to smash your brain only seconds later.
05 Necrobyte - is definetely one of the more noisier tracks on this album. Not much to say about this track other than it's utter noise combined with dark, droning beats. The sickly synths sound like something from what could mayhap be the soundtrack of a horror movie in the future. The "funeral metal" influences meantioned in the original description of this album is also noticable in this track. Slow, grinding, low guitar noises combined with dark chords take care of that part.
06 6 - no, this track is not named "66". It's "6". Not "six", but "6". I have no idea what meaning the title bears, other than perhaps emphasis the track number. This track starts off with sounds of the ocean. Although this ocean doesn't sound like your every-day ocean. It sounds like an ocean which probably holds vicious evil, much like Giygas himself. This track is more of one with grinding, droning beats rather than synths. Apoteg's early influences of Giygas can also be clearly heard on this track.
07 Spirals - is a track which I have not heard before, unlike the tracks stated above. A short track, this one, but that certainly does not mean it's any less in quality. A short, droning track which would make one feel very uneasy at night. The same applies for
08 Memory - this track quickly picks up the pace again as "Spirals" lets you go for a few short seconds, allowing you to catch your breath, which is thereafter malevolently taken away by another rather drony track. Some wicked, twisted, low piano - or that's what I think it is - guides the beat up to a climax, whereafter things slow down a little into an ambient part, which is later continued in
09 Nail - definetely explains the "funeral metal" influences. Sure, it has some droning beats and ravaging noise-jolts, but the main focus is ultimately the doomy atmosphere of this track. This is the only track which made me feel a bit uneasy and is also the one which awoke me from my "trace-like state". Also quite dissettling is the fact that I could swear I heard voice-like shapes, as if someone was talking in the vicious synths about a minute before the end.
10 The Remains - as the descripion of the album already stated, this track and the two proceeding after this one are "an indication of things to come". I have no idea why Apoteg didn't save these tracks for the next album. Even without these tracks the album is long enough and contains more than enough material to keep you listening to it for quite a while. I can see why Apoteg calls these tracks "unsuited" for this release, though. That doesn't mean they're bad. They're just something different. This track particularly. It scared the living guts out of me when I first heard it. I'm not going to say any more about it, you'll have to figure this one out by yourself. Well, just one little thing then. This track sounds as if it could induce nightmares if you would have it play in the background while you were asleep. I'm not going to try that out.
11 End - is definetely one of the more ambient tracks on this album. Although "not really part of this album", it does add a great deal to it. This track scared the outright shit out of me at one point not so very far into the song and continued to do so for nearly three minutes long. This track ends in ambience. Dark, semi-conscious, oppressing ambience.
12 Time - a rude awakening from the sleepy ambience-ish ending of "End". Mostly a noise track, this one, with lots of feedback and dissettling drones. Giygas' influence upon Apoteg's soul is also quite noticable in this track, working as a catalyst for the doomy drones and menacing noise. The ending quite pleasantly surprised me to hear two out-of-phase synths trying to overrule eachother, but barely not succeeding each time they tried. The resulting dissonance fits well with the entire track, being a good close-off for this album.
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