ISON: Stars & Embers (POST ROCK): review / opinion to read on Music Waves

To make up for the departure of Heike Langhans, with whom he founded ISON, Daniel Änghede had the excellent idea when recording "Aurora" of calling on several female singers rather than replacing her with just one. But he couldn't repeat this recipe, successful as it was, for the third album, this time forcing himself to recruit a new singer in her own right. He was spoilt for choice among the eight female guests who lent their voices to the successor to 'Inner-Space'. While many of us imagined him continuing a collaboration with Sylvaine, who inspired him to write the most beautiful track on 'Aurora', it is Lisa Cuthbert who finally takes over the post, which is very good too.

Little known in France, the Irish singer (and pianist) has enjoyed a fine career on the fringes of atmospheric rock and doomgaze for nearly fifteen years. Emotional and hazy, her voice lends itself wonderfully to ISON's spatial, contemplative universe. Her participation in "Aurora" proved it; "Stars & Embers" confirms it. But she's not the only one haunting this new album. Circle&wind, who also took part in 'Aurora', appear on a heady, ethereal 'Radiant Void'. But it's above all the presence of Mikael Stanne (Dark Tranquillity) that whets our curiosity. Far from his usual cavernous register, the Swede reminds us just how poignant his clear voice can be, as 'Peregrination' and 'Beings Of Light' are vibrant witnesses.

This magnificent, spectral vocal palette is the main quality of 'Stars & Embers'. This was already the case with its predecessors, with which it shares the same faults, namely a relative lack of nuance and, more seriously, a tendency to drag on beyond the sixty-minute mark. A track like 'Embers', which is sublime to say the least, would have benefited from its seventeen-minute length being trimmed a little, even if its pulsating beauty wins the day.

Faithful to its post rock tinged with drone and space ambient, ISON takes its time stretching out its nebulous framework over which Lisa Cuthbert's ethereal vocals hover. Drowned in electronic layers, the guitar is discreet but emerges in small, pointillist touches ('Luminescent Reverie'), a reflection of the care that Daniel Änghede always takes with the arrangements and the instrumental vault that unfolds with delicacy. Initially monotonous if not boring, 'Stars & Embers' is even more deserving than its predecessors. But once you've settled comfortably into the cocoon it weaves, it's hard not to be entranced by its astral, trance-like dimension, a work both intimate and hypnotic that seems to blossom endlessly...

Will the collaboration between ISON and Lisa Cuthbert survive this third (un)inhabited flight? Only time will tell, but we wouldn't mind if the Swede, despite the success of 'Stars & Embers', decided to change singer for each album... - Official website

ISON

STARS & EMBERS

AVANTGARDE MUSIC

POST ROCK