Coffins: "Craving to Eternal Slumber"

Any thoughts that I might have had about this band being slow death metal rather than doom is given renewed credence on their new ep. It took a few listens to get over this but the power of their chug and the bass player's embellishments underneath the slugging sludge add more depth. The low vocal roars are complemented by the layers of higher screamy vocals and then into the low-spoken section.  The second song "Tyrant" is more deliberate in its pacing. It doesn't take long however before they head off into a murky speed. It sure the hell is not as interesting as the first song.  The chug doesn't grab you until midway through. The first real doom passage we come across on this album is on the title track. The throat-scarping guttural vocals work their best here and the foreboding prescience that hangs over this song is what doom should sound like, it's not funereal doom, but solidly morbid nonetheless. The more death metal side of the band works when they kick into building heavier dynamics. On the title track, they do this without fully crossing over into death metal, but more of a Godzilla lumber. This is not to stay the more Celtic Frost gone death metal chug they charged in with on the opener was good, it just was not the doom I was looking for. When it sped up past the tempo of the first riff it got a little muddy. While I know Celtic Frost influenced doom, I don't think they were doom, as they came out of the thrash era, but were less thrashy than say Voivod.

When the vocals are hatefully layered it makes the big eminently violent riffs hit harder. They descend back into the unrestrained pound of death metal on "Stairway to Torment", which might as well be an old Cannibal Corpse song. It gets better when it slows down at the midway point and the low spoken narrative comes in like a Slayer song. But as soon as he goes "ugh" they are racing back off. I'll give this ep a 7.5. It's heavy and raw, so if you don't need much more and are already a fan then you are already all over this. If you just want to check them out well you can do so below, it's good, but I am not sure that this is their best work.

Interview : Mirai Kawashima of Sigh

I recently got to catch up and pick the brain of Sigh's main man Mirai Kawashima to discuss the new album "Graveward" and the ghosts of metal past present and future.



With "Scenes From Hell" you took a sharper turn into a more progressive sound, "Graveward"retains that but steps back into a more metal direction as well what inspired this?


Mirai : The biggest inspiration on this album is 70s / 80s Italian zombie flicks. At first I was planning to make it filled with old keyboards like Minimoog, Mellotron, Hammond, Fender Rhodes etc. as a dedication to those movies. The final result was pretty much different from the initial plan, but I think you still sense the atmosphere of zombie movies.

I'm not sure what you meant by "metal direction", but "Graveward" is filled with mid-paced to up-tempo songs, I mean they're slower than those on "Hangman's Hymn" or "Scenes from Hell". In that sense, "Graveward" is a very metal album. Other than that, the change of guitarist affected a lot on the sound. I'll talk about it later.

There are quite a few guest performers on "Graveward. Of all these guest musicians who has been in the back of your minds the longest as someone you've been waiting to work with?

 Mirai :  It would be great if we could work with Mika Patton or John Zorn.

In most genres aside from metal the guitar solo has almost become a lost art. The guitar playing on this has really stepped up to the next level, Was this influenced by having guys like Matt Heafy around?

Mirai :The reason is very simple. We hired the new guitarist who can play the guitar way better than the old one. Unfortunately we had to fire the guitarist during the recording of "Graveward" because it became obvious that he was losing his passion on music. He started chasing a preadolescent underground idol who has only 10 fans or so and now he spends all his money and time on that crap. It was a tough decision for us to fire somebody we had worked together for more than 20 years, but we had no other way. We were lucky enough to have been able to find the new guitarist, You Oshima. He released two albums as Kadenzza on Holy Records from France. He definitely brought us the higher level in the guitar playing.

I really love the darker direction "The Forlorn" goes in how does this song represent the exploration of beyond the grave horror the album seems to be taking ? There also seems to be less or the more polka or klezmer movements to this album was this done to create a more somber tone?

 Mirai : Well, I didn't think about polka or klezmer music when I wrote the songs for "Graveward". If you hear Klezmer in it, probably it comes from John Zorn. Dr. Mikannibal and I are a huge admirer of John Zorn works including Masada stuff, so there might be some subconscious influence from his Klezmer works.

There are some weird electronic elements to "the Molesters of My Soul" it almost has an industrial feel to it, are you fans of  industrial or darkwave? 

 Mirai :Yes, I mainly love old industrial / Darkwave stuff such as Laibach, Foetus, Big Black, Goethe's Erben, Das Ich, Dead Relatives, CCC CNC NCN, Coil, Nurse with Wound, Throbbing Gristle etc. But influences of the electronic elements on "The Molesters" rather come from more experimental stuff like Karheinz Stockhausen, Pansonic, Mouse on Mars etc.

Thrash metal is one of the more predominate colors you paint the album with. What thrash albums from the 80s and 90s have been most inspiring to you over the years?

 Mirai :The most inspiring album on Sigh's music must be "Into the Pandemonium" by Celtic Frost.
If I have to pick up the best thrash album, I'd say "Power and Pain" by Whiplash.
Are there any plans to tour in support of "Graveward"? 

 Mirai : We will play at Graspop Metal Meeting in Belgium and then headline for Metal Magic Festival in Denmark with Candlemass and Girlschool. And we will play a few shows here in Japan but that's all planned right now. Now Dr. Mikannibal has a baby so we need to slow down our activity a little bit

"A Messenger From Tomorrow" is a song that really stands out to me. Aside from the slower pace there places where vocals have some really lush textured layers with the more growled providing a counter point. What others roles do you see the harsher vocals taking in you music? 

 Mirai :Harsh vocals and singing ones are two totally different things. Harsh vocals can express something which singing ones cannot and vice versa. For example, if you want to express fear and pain, obviously you have to scream. Also I believe the harsh vocals are strictly connected to English, which is a very rhythmic language. I think music such as thrash metal or hip hop which does not have the clear melody line is a spawn of English.

Some people might not know You guys were at the forefront of the second wave of black metal that came out in the 90s along side bands like Darkthrone. At what point did you feel black metal was too confining for your growth as a musician? What are your thoughts on the current state of black metal? 

 Mirai :To be honest, we never thought like we started as a black metal and soon grew out of it. It's either we're always a black metal band or we never are. It's just a matter of definition of what black metal is. The Second Wave of Black Metal was born more or less as a resurrection of 80s evil thrash metal like Venom, Bathory and Hellhammer which was considered to be completely out of date in the beginning of 90s. In that sense, we had exactly the same intention. Also the word "black metal" does not its musical style any more. All the bands like Emperor, Beherit, Alcest, and Deafheaven are often labeled as black metal but probably people who know nothing about black metal will not be able to find the reason why they all are pigeonholed under the same category. So if we still need to pigeonhole our music style, I'd say it's black metal.
I must admit that I am not a black metal expert. I know EVERYTHING about 80s thrash metal, though. Honestly I have never kept up with black metal even from the early 90s, I'm not the right one to say something about it.

Thanks for allowing me to pick your brain.

Sigh: "Graveward"

Once upon a time one of my favorite black metal bands put out an album called "Scenes From Hell" and they transformed from one of my favorite black metal bands into one of my favorite prog metal  bands. Their new album finds them getting some of the aggression back as they study the various aspects of death. One thing that is interesting about Sigh is even though they are based in Tokyo the band does not employ the Oriental dodecaphonic scale, but pulls from western music ranging from Deep Purple of klezmer. This album opens in a fairly straight forward metal manner for these guys, with slight leaning toward an Emperor like sound as the clean vocals sweep in amid the twists and turns normally narrated by the more scathing snarls. The clean vocals have a more typical progressive metal vibrato, like something Therion might thrown in. They continue to use a chaotic mix of varied elements which are sometimes stirred together more smoothly than others. There are some good metallic moments to the title track, which settled in with me quicker than the opening song that took a few listens to sink in.

 The keyboards coating "the Tombfiller" have a more folk metal majesty to them. The vocals retain the songs most savage sense. The clean vocals here are almost too bright her for me.The guitar playing continues to be one of the band's most impressive elements, with the drumming not too far behind. The songs are not long epics but rather concise considering all of the things being jammed into them. Layers of operatic chorus abound, making this a good album for someone that has outgrown Nightwish. The lavish experimentation and song writing reach their balance on " The Forlorn" which carries plenty of meat on its bones. The song also reaches down into a darker and heavier place that I like to hear coming from the band.

This album is much heavier than any thing they have done since "Hangman's Hymn". So fans of the bands older work will not feel like they are listening to a Mr. Bungle album despite the weird electronics attacking a song like " the Molestors of My Soul". Some of the riffs on here grind into you more like death metal. The polka metal the band has visited peeks out slightly in the frantic racing of "Out of the Grave". It seems Mikannibal's sax exploits are more toned down on this album. They hit a pretty powerful chug that collides with some over the top vocals on " the Trial By the Dead".  The thrashy riffs that hit a minute and a half into the song will compel you to head band. The heaviness continues it's rampage even when it collides into jazz on "The Casketburner". The piano work on this song is pretty spot on for the styles the are mocking. 

" A Messenger From Tomorrow" has a much different feel from all the other songs on this albums. The slower pacing is the most obvious, but the melodic sensibility takes a more dominate role than the aggression that runs rampant on the rest of the album. The clean vocals make more sense and feel better on this song as well. To be called "Dwellers in Dream" the song has more of a rock n roll feel to it. The vocal trade off in this song is one of the more effective uses of the harsher vocals. I am glad they are embracing the heavier side of what they do here, I think the song writing as a whole was better on a few of the previous albums. I'll see how this shred fest sits with me, for now I will give this album a 9.