Laetitia In Holocaust: The Tortoise Boat

What do you have if you take away the highly distorted & cold guitar riffs from Black Metal? Another type of grim music called: Rotten Light. Very little details are to be found regarding this Italian act, besides the fact of having previously released a couple demos before. The first one, Blood on Humanity, followed by A Slow Apocalypse, as well as an EP named Lacra Ebenei: 13-17.

Laetitia in Holocaust insist on one fact: this is not Black Metal. The Tortoise Boat has a bit of a demo feel, although the sound production itself is pretty good. The rhythmic section (drum and bass) is somewhat blurred and put in the second rank. Upfront you have the clean tremolo picking and lead guitar work. Somewhere in between, are the raspy vocals. No rhythm guitar are heard, most of the times, which is mainly responsible for that demo feel. You do have some riffs once and a while, although not present on every songs. I found this music adventurous and a bit dry, I mean without too much harmonies in most cases. You can feel a certain progressive touch, caused by the intricate time signatures.

A couple tracks stand out as being more diversified and melodious. They are: "Hissing Through the Veins of the God" and "Immanence and Illumination". The first song adds more melodies to their work by using a classical guitar, ambient keyboards, strange sounds and some sick whispers. On the 12 minutes plus closer, darkly atmospheric keyboards, electronics, arpeggios, cool vocal effects and an overall crunchier sound is carrying you to the end.

Track listing:
1 - Hair as the Salt of Carthago
2 - Descent
3 - The Gift of Fury
4 - Hissing Through the Veins of the Gods
5 - A Gesture Before you Enter the Darkness
6 - Immanence and Illumination

Added: October 15th 2009
Reviewer: Denis Brunelle
Score:
Related Link: Band MySpace Page
Hits: 2816
Language: english

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