Labels: Totenschiff
Review by: Andy Malcolm
I saw Killed by Malaise last summer at an all dayer in Germany, so it was fairly appropriate that pretty much a year to
the day of that show I picked up a seven inch that had them on whilst at a show in France. They’ve split up now, so
this is the only vinyl output they’ll probably end up with – they have some CD’s too I think, I heard one this morning and
it was rocking. On this seven they do a singular long track entitled “Endzeit Erwachen” and it’s a monster. A seething
mass of screeched and cried vocals (these are particularly good), bombastic guitar grooves and dark emo twinkles. They
have got the sound down really well, mastering the art of the build up and the breakdown equally well. It’s late 90’s emo
in a perfect form, reminding me of the Euro-emo sound perpetuated lately by La Quiete or if you want something Stateside
then perhaps Spirt of Versailles. I was dead impressed with this, but then again it’s an emo band so you’re probably not
too surprised. Good to hear a Euro band that isn’t a Usurp / Orchid clone. Useless fact: when you play their side on
45rpm instead of 33, the opening sample sounds like Gollum.
I had no idea what to expect from Danse Macabre, they seem a bit more of a standard screamo band, with those Jeromes Dream
style yelped vocals, but the music switches around a lot. At times it is melodic, then it gets fast and spazzy, and then
they get all chuggy and moshy with fast guitars like Hot Cross mixed up in there. Not bad at all, and the jangly bits on
“60 Sekunden Rhetorik” spliced with the desperate shouting work great. Solid band, not quite as generic as the vocals
would have you expect.