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Review: 'EDEN HOUSE, THE'
'Songs For the Broken Ones'   

-  Label: 'Jungle Records'
-  Genre: 'Post-Rock' -  Release Date: '23rd June 2017'-  Catalogue No: 'FreudCD123'

Our Rating:
For anyone who has missed The Eden House's previous couple of albums, they are a collaborative music project and a side project of 3 members of Fields Of Nephilim and invited musicians and singers. These other collaborators include members of The Mission and Penguin Cafe Orchestra. This time around the guest vocalists include Lee Douglas from Anathema, Kelli Ali and Meg Pettit from Sneaker Pimps, Monica Richards and Louise Crane.

The opening song, Verdades (I Have Chosen You) has a sort of Arabic goth feel to it, all swirling strings and just enough to draw you into the band's world. And what a world it is to be drawn into...

One Heart again swirls around the room and draws you into a wonderfully epic goth love song which opens up the more you listen to it. Misery doesn't sound half as sad as the title suggests but features some breathy vocals over the strings and drums. It almost sounds like an anglicised version of TransGlobal Underground crossed with The Creatures.

I love the almost whispered vocals at the start of 12th Night that has the feel of an early Ofra Haza song to me, with a touch of say Temple of Love-era Sisters Of Mercy as they try to wake the dead and have some sort of resurrection. This has a great epic widescreen feel to it.

The Ghost Of You is a slow, funereal love song for a departed lover. It sounds a bit like Anathema before it breaks open a bit and then back into the ululating waters of despair and longing, rather like a stripped bare Within Temptation song which is sort of marrying together two bands I saw for the first time one after the other in a tent at the Download festival. Somehow, this song has sparked that memory in this listener: a ghost of a festival long since passed. That said it is, of course, Meg Pettitt from Sneaker Pimps singing on The Ghost Of You.

Ours Again sounds like many a floor filler at the Electric Ballroom on a Friday night in days gone by. Or at The Electroworks these days. When you reach the neo-rap part in the middle I can see a woman in New Rocks miming out the lyrics as she dances as she stretches out her hand to be taken to another world.

It's Just A Death opens like a real slow ambient piece as the story starts to unfold and the music builds the structure for the life departing in an epic full blown scene and then to the wonderfully intricate quiet middle section as the singer dreams of her departed friend. The song builds once more with longing and a sense of regret that the friend is no longer here. This is full on melodramatic goth love as she will not die for you. No, she can't die yet, she has more songs to sing.

Words And Deeds keeps the dark mood you'd expect with plenty of strings surrounding a really cool guitar solo and of course many words to explain those deeds. I love the percussion breakdown and then as it goes epic towards the end. This is very sophisticated and well produced and needs to be heard over and over to let everything seep in.

Let Me In has a nice woozy string-laden intro as the singer implores to be let in. I think hearts are melting and doors are opening as much as the grave she sings about. She may wish to join her love in the grave but most of us are just melting, hoping she'll fall into our open arms enveloped in the gorgeous music bringing everyone together. Strangely, in the middle of the song, my doorbell rang with someone I don't want to let in as the vocals repeat "Let me in" repeatedly, making it much spookier.

Kiss Kiss Bang Bang is the only song with co-credits additional to The Eden House in this case Kellie Ali. It does feel a bit like some of Sneaker Pimps' slower songs but it also builds and sounds a bit like The Creatures in places and in terms of the other songs with this title it is obviously closer to Specimen than The Celibate Rifles. It's also my favourite song on the album - just a great piece of music.

Second Skin starts like much of the rest of the album with strings and a glorious dark feeling. In this case a good pulsing bass as the slow story of despair and darkness as they shed their second skin. It's quite breathless, almost like the signer is whispering something in your ear you'll never forget.

The album closes with the epic 8 minutes plus The Ardent Tide, which has a claustrophobic feel to begin with as the drama starts to unfold. The story within the song unfolds sort of in chapters delineated by the builds and falls in the intensity of the music. A great way to finish a really beautifully crafted album.


Find Songs For The Broken ones here: The Eden House album at Amazon

Find out more about The Eden House here: The Eden House Facebook page
  author: simonovitch

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EDEN HOUSE, THE - Songs For the Broken Ones