Author: Sandi Sadar Šoba
Artist: Haunted, The
Label: Century Media
Release: 2011
Length: 54:15
Rating: 4.7/5
Seven is a fairy-tale number, and truth be told, not all the original fairy tales were full of kitsch. And no, every now and then the wolf who ate grandma and her whole brood got off scot-free, even after he’d gobbled up a few gnomes and self-appointed critics for dessert. Scot-free, and rightly so! The Haunted cleared out the valves after the rage of the Versus record and reached for a cleaner, more vintage sound, which won’t sit well with anyone who hasn’t mentally evolved past the albums The Haunted or Made Me Do It and One Kill Wonder, which, my dears, were written by fingers belonging to musicians thirteen years younger, and for the throat of a completely different singer. In between came rEVOLVEr, The Dead Eye and the change behind the mic. And Unseen offers exactly what the title says: a previously unseen dimension of understanding meter and musical possibilities that, if you absolutely must stick labels on your ears and smear your thoughts with pointless comparisons, truly sounds more poppy and danceable. And yes, it sounds soft and less thrashy.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=as63fqxybt0
The Haunted have given up mimicry and gone looking for their own answer to the endless palette of copycatting (if nothing else, they loudly said no to imitating themselves). Yes, heresy has happened, and thank the gods for it, because recreating sounds and guitar riffs we’ve already heard is so often just a pointless denial of a lack of ideas, balls and the ability to achieve a full astral erection, which The Haunted undoubtedly have. In fact, the first thing that jumps out at you is that they’ve got a gigantic pair of phenomenally juicy balls, which they gently shove down your throat. And if that doesn’t suit you, you can choke on it in your own agony and file a complaint with the office for the protection of “true” metalheads.
So let’s go nice and orderly, like the houses in Trieste. Unseen is melodic and schizophrenic in the way it strings together different images, which singer Peter Dolving described as “epic, danceable, groovy and very ‘farty metal’. The point of the record is to piss all over 99.9% of the generic Mr. Goetske morons out there in the black-and-white world!” Mission accomplished, because most of the old caustic venom has left the now somewhat processed poison glands and, as befits their age, wrapped itself in a slightly warmer, softer garment. The toughest bit is the opening, with the kerosene-soaked Never Better, which by the chorus already transforms phenomenally into a fluffy veil that teases with the verses: “Ashes to ashes / Dust to dust / Some build for failure / Some build for trust”. I can’t ignore the fact that The Haunted have become Opeth-like progressive in crafting their vignettes, and they have the tools for carving up mind and ears beautifully, like few other musical preachers. This time the sermon is a little less loud, which is confirmed by the stoner-inspired follow-up, No Ghost. It’s like injecting pure extract of the phenomenal Clutch from Blast The Tyrant straight into your veins, yet The Haunted still have enough sense of aesthetics of their own that you can’t slip into a state of dementia, delusion or simply the inability to do basic math. “As it flows, you might not know the motion / Ain’t no ghost, there’s only love or nothing / All you want, / And if my hands can’t touch it it’s mine” sings Mr. Dolving, while you fall into a hypnotic state, endlessly stroked by the retro guitars of Patrik Jensen and Anders Björler and carried by the greasy rhythms of drummer Per Möller Jensen and bassist Jonas Björler. One of the biggest surprises on the record is the Deftones-flavored Catch 22, which shakes you up every which way, with the enigma hiding in the closing verses. “Someone to connect the pieces / Someone who will speak his mind / Someone who will carry what we’re all afraid to really say / How infuriating and obscene / Apologetic in absurdum / No-one wants to feel” hints at a drive toward fragmentation and digging deeper than your usual haiku stanzas. After that, all that’s left is the vanishing of the old self, which Disappear confirms with the finely tuned sound of a divine cynic in the song Motionless. “Everything you say’s been said before / By someone just like you and me / It’s a comfort can’t you see” creeps up the back of your neck and gnaws tirelessly and stubbornly on its way to the center of the universe. The peak of the new aesthetic blazes in the massive title track, penned by Coldtears member David Johansson, which cuts to the heart with verses that offer no direct divine answer to the question of the meaning of a new existence, with the words “And so it stays unseen / Under the surface / Right out of touch / Right out of reach / And so it stays unseen / Until we shine the light of truthful loving trust / It’s never going to change”. What’s unique about this new look is that you’ll understand every single word. The lovely follow-up, the crystal-sweet The Skull, caresses and rocks you with a jazzy, truly deep progressive note of gigantic, grandiose symphonic sound that later slices into a wild thrash stampede. “No more hesitation / No more slipping away / No more waiting for a loving grace / Easy now / Go lightly these are tricky times / We don’t need much fuel to feed the fire”. Once you’re integrated into the new meaning, you can digest the concept that runs through the whole thing, and for the vain enthusiasts of rustic fury, there’s The City, which nails you to the cross with a string of phenomenal riffs and lyrics woven with artfully embroidered threads of cynicism and humor. You just have to listen up and give up your pointless, conscience-free insistence on stubborn opposition to the cycle of change and maturing. Them follows a somewhat noisier rhythm of enraged fire-spewers who scream “So in love with a monster / And a precious lie / But someone’s got to pay / For each and every single fuck up!”, while the crowds get ground up and glued into a granite series of fresh, phenomenal mental manipulation. Here The Haunted go toe to toe with Tool, only their beast is a little less mathematical and swears by the musicality of pure primal instinct. The end is nigh, announced by All Ends Well, which strings together pearls of storytelling. Maybe it’s a tale of sadomasochism, of the eclectic feeling of a conformist who craps all over the moralizing of the world, or maybe just a loud and clear critique of a world of dumbed-down zombies. “I don’t want more than a moment / That’s all that I can take / I don’t care who talks about us / I don’t care what people say” shakes hands with the closing act, the song Done. “Love is stronger than all / We can cry and pretend / But we know there’s something real / Some men say we’re from the first breath to the last / You should carry your head high / Cause I’m done / Digging myself deeper / Done looking for escape / Done playing games / Your validation’s not worth my time” The Haunted lay all their aces on the table, and I don’t know if there are many who hold better cards.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IxZakwbrFLc
Unseen scatters and rearranges the layout of your skull vault with a gentler, murderous logic. The Haunted have never sounded this soft, never cut this deep, never poured out such a clean sound or exposed themselves so much to critics and salvos of negative whining, yet I can say with pride and honor that the time of a new era in how we see the world called The Haunted has finally arrived. The heart is on a platter, and only now do you realize it’s possible to dissect the pump of existence and feeling, both physically and emotionally, even with a butter knife. My only regret is that Unseen didn’t follow directly after The Dead Eye, since Versus plows the textures a bit roughly and drags down the average. In any case, all I can say for myself is that I feel the deepest admiration, and with a standing ovation I beg for the next dose of sonic provocation, cynicism and uprightness, which is so chronically scarce in a world of imitators.
This review was written in collaboration between RockLine and Rock Hard Slovenija.
Lineup
• Patrik Jensen – rhythm guitar
• Jonas Björler – bass
• Anders Björler – lead guitar
• Peter Dolving – vocals
• Per Möller Jensen – drums
Production
Tue Madsen
Track list
01. Never Better
02. No Ghost
03. Catch 22
04. Disappear
05. Motionless
06. Unseen
07. The Skull
08. Ocean Park
09. The City
10. Them
11. All Ends Well
12. Done
13. Attention*
14. The Reflection (live)*
15. The Fallout (live)*
