Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Artist: Siddharta
Label: Self-released
Release: 2009
Running time: 54:43
Rating: 4/5
Siddharta. Something like an imprint of the Slovenian character blend. No band could define that “Slovenian” element in rock better, or get along with it as well in their own evolution, than Siddharta. They developed their own style, kept nurturing an interesting rock vision the whole way through, and kept the Slovenian language in it thoroughly attractive. And they crawled into Slovenes’ consciousness so deep that every one of us likes (or dislikes) to take the time to hold forth on our personal feelings about them. Can’t deny it. Over all these years they’ve become an important part of everyday Slovenian (rock) culture.
You hardly know what new thing to say at the mention of Siddharta. Fifth studio album, recorded in the US with renowned producer Ross Robinson. The basic character traits remain clearly recognizable in this new one, called “Saga”. So: typical arrangements that can only smell like Siddharta. That means the clearly shaped melodic arrangements of solemn tunes in the choruses. Melancholic, sometimes even overly pathetic and forever suffering in its romanticism, yet the next moment heads held high, seething with sobs, joy and passion. Armed with a concrete melody and excellent verses, even the new “Saga” doesn’t leave us in the lurch.
“Saga” is a record that doesn’t get under your skin as quickly as you’d expect, given the familiar, or the expected. It doesn’t chase hits and it’s not just an album of obligatory rock n’ roll “kicking ass”. No strings, no horns, no orchestra. “Saga” is actually the closing of a developmental circle and the start of a new one. By that logic the end of every story should be joined to its beginning, and so perhaps the most apt parallels to the energy of “Saga” can be drawn with the debut “ID”. With “ID” they were honest and therefore vulnerable. This time it’s not much different, except they know how to defend that nakedness, or honesty, better. Still, the important feeling the album gives is that the guys expressed their ideas on it in equal measure as a quintet, and that on that front the album comes across as incredibly mature and confident, leaving a feeling of triumph that is far from forced, along with a sense that the bonds within the quintet are even stronger and more intense. Simply put, the guys got to know each other even better while the album was coming together.
Keyboards play a hugely important role this time. The symphonic arrangements are gone. So is the rock bombast. What’s left? A flirtation with human imagination as a natural “emulator” of sound, poured into the realm of keys and colorful knobs. Sounds terribly clever on paper, but it isn’t. Tomaž uses a wide palette of sounds to dress up individual parts of the songs. Pushing to the front above all are the (rediscovered) primitive sounds of the first synthesizers from the late seventies and early eighties, and they’re not hard to spot even in songs by bands of the era, from Duran Duran to Rush (in their synth “eighties” period) – an example is the second verse of Alarm.
Equipped like this, the new Siddharta don’t necessarily go looking for repeating transitions; you can even sense a bit of an exploratory spirit, playfulness, wittiness in the songs. Already Narava surprises, but the whole structure – the song’s concept – is responsible for that. In a song like Alarm, meanwhile, the guys no longer go for a repeating accompaniment pattern and playing through lead motifs. What comes through above all is the atmospheric stirring of songs like Vojne idej, which has many contrasting transitions between lead motifs and which the band, floating on synths, drives with “drumming” force into a final “crescendo”. This is where the band’s artistic maturing sparkles.
There are nine songs of the kind we usually expect from Siddharta. Two depart from it “mildly”. The first is actually the last track, Tom Waits For Me, in which the band found a sensible conclusion to “Saga”. The song itself is in English, and the synth sound that closes it is the same as the opening of Narava, which opens the album. So the end and the beginning are somehow linked again on the record. Still, it’s exactly in this song that I’d find the album’s only major minus. It’s too different from all the other “Saga” songs, so it would perhaps work better as a bonus on some released single. The closer on an album like this should be more intense. Say, with a song in the style of Vojna idej.
The second song that departs from the usual is a jam of over 10 minutes, which is an excellent refresher and somehow opens up vistas for the music lover onto a new quality of the band’s character, one they hadn’t known until now. Unbelievable, right? Siddharta can even play an instrumental. Here the band, on a minimalist principle, layers collage upon collage into a rich weave that, with its varied sonic picture and mysterious atmosphere of floating, a sort of undulation, eases the intensity of the rest of the album. With little effort the band pulled off an excellent move here. It showed itself in a new light and pleasantly surprised. This rock-wise less intense moment might work better somewhere in the middle of the album, taking the pressure off the intensity of the album’s close, which Tom Waits For Me doesn’t quite justify.
More convincing, of course, are the shorter tracks, where Siddharta once again successfully create dynamically varied contrasts of mood between verse and chorus, with the peaks of the songs generated once more by choruses shaped in that typical Siddharta way, with solemnly dark tunes. This time you’ll pick your own album favorites. Probably everyone could still agree that the song Baroko is the album’s most beautiful moment, in terms of the melodic shaping alone. The guitar “stereo chorus” acts here as the dominant creator of the mood, alongside the indispensable color and approach of Tomi M.’s vocal. The latter is again fully immersed, and in the emotional engraving across the album he keeps adding that necessary pinch of salt to the soup so the songs come alive convincingly, feel real, and work perfectly. The lead melodies are diverse and the songs contrast with one another. Angel Diabolo is a furious rocker “rodeo”, the opposite experience from the positively tuned Stampedo (the latter is close to Madam in energy, right before the end of the album), which for more than half its length eases the album’s intensity in a light trot so that it can float freely into the aforementioned instrumental. After it the album necessarily revives as it flashes successfully through the excellent song Vojna idej (which on the new album gently sums up the point of the band’s past “symphonic rock/metal” era), where the inclusion of the thundering line stands out: “Enough wine! Let the city drink water!” After it Siddharta should have wedged in another harder-hitting song (of the Alarm or Nevarno mesto type), but the album is slowly heading to its end. Alarm and Nevarno mesto in the first half of the album raise the dark mood, for which Angel Diabolo had already established the right working chemistry. That mood then vibrates even more intensely, even more theatrically in its contrasts, creating a post-apocalyptic vision, the verses radiating a need to preserve and save one’s own individual self, because to save the “sick fools” or those “with bowed heads” whose “asses are burning”, there’s too little time left in the era of the human race.
The new album is a fresh, tightly shaped Siddharta record. The band’s power to skillfully strike deals with many moods through tricks of minimalism, which was always one of the main attractions of its point, is here. It’s with us and it’s thrilling. It’s poured into the coherent workings of the quintet, where the flowing, varied keyboard sounds, combining programmed patterns and guitar phrases, play an important role in preserving the characteristic Sidddharta vibe. These, now in a new quality of harmonic vibration, accompany Tomi’s striking vocal, reinforce its expressive power, magnify it. Sound layered upon sound into a colorful mass you can freely and totally painlessly hang out in for unlimited time, and where even the atypical beginning and end of the album keep their sense. The album works loose, relaxed, unobtrusive, and doesn’t chase hits. With it Siddharta get over their superiority complex, walk on solid ground and widen their expressive range to reach more demanding listeners too. The start of a new story.
Lineup
Tomi M. – vocals, guitar
Primož B. – guitar
Tomaž O.R. – keyboards
Jani H. – bass guitar
Boštjan M. – drums
Production
Ross Robinson
Tracklist
1. Narava
2. Angel Diabolo
3. Alarm
4. Nevarno Mesto
5. Napalm 3
6. Baroko
7. Stampedo
8. Od Mraka Do Zore
9. Vojna Idej
10. Madam
11. Tom Waits For Me
