### Sigh: Scenes from hell

#### 04/03/10 || Khlysty

One really cannot overstate Sigh’s importance over extreme metal. These crazies from Tokyo have, since the early ‘90s, carved themselves a significant niche within metal’s wooly world, creating music that, while informed and clearly influenced by thrash and early black metal, has a seriously damaged –and damaging- character all its own. By mixing and meshing, within their furious brand of metal, elements of orchestral dementia, avant-garde excursions into abstractions of heavosity and quite a lot of playful forays into all kinds of craziness, Sigh easily overpass and pisses on each and every canon of metal, while, at the same time, offering great insights in what heavy music can be when manic genius and bold experimentation are united and work in tandem.

After the less-than-stellar Gallows Gallery, where Sigh tried to update their sound, inserting elements of even “pop” songwriting, in 2007 Hangman’s Hymn remedied all faults and showed the band ready and willing to again become the frontrunner of experimental thrash/black/symphonic metal (mind you, when I say “symphonic”, I don’t mean Dimmu Borgir overblown shit, but an impressive use of mainly synthetic orchestration that sweeps in, out and over the furious guitar/bass/drums basis that consists Sigh’s music). Having found a sympathetic nest among The End Records’ roster, the band seemed comfy-cozy and ready to continue its excursions into metallic mania and mayhem.

So, now it’s 2010 and Sigh return with a new and clearly improved version of themselves. Put as bluntly as it goes, “Scenes From Hell” is a wonderfully demented, hyper-technical, laser-scalpel-precise slab of their characteristic and totally idiosyncratic sound. Graced with an impressive cover, the record contains eight songs that move with exceptional ease and precision from blackened thrash fury (that will grab the listener by the cojones and have him bleating in a bliss-and-pain combo), to cinematic grandeur and orchestral genius (listen to the waltz-from-Hell of “The Summer Funeral” which is the second part of the three-part “Musica in Tempora Belli” suite and, please, tell if it ain’t one of the most left-brained and enjoyable takes on metal you’ve ever heard…).

Every song is liberally slathered with orchestral parts (strings, horns, piano), but one has to understand that these parts are not superfluous expressions of self-gratification, but integral elements of the songwriting process and critical pieces of the puzzle that each song provides to the listener. This is best displayed in “Musica in Tempora Belli” song, where the guitar plays something that’s obviously classical music-inspired/derived (although, for the life of me, I cannot pinpoint the exact piece of music that the guitar part is taken from…), while the orchestral parts are quite subdued and controlled. Add to all the above the speed and precision the band provides throughout the record and Mirai Kawashima’s raspy vocalizations and agonized growls and the whole is impressive, to say the least.

One other element that has to be underlined is how much fun is listening to the record. Sigh juxtapose the dark and hell-bent-on-destruction compositions with enough sonic bravura and hints towards completely unrelated musical genres (please, please, listen to the almost-gypsy violin and horn section in “L’ Art de Mourir” over the almost atonal black/thrash riffing, or the Wangerian sturm-und-drang AND the jazzy undertones that can be found in “The Soul Grave”), that one cannot but smile at the absurdity of it all, while at the same time being amazed at how well everything works and how the fun never detracts from the inherent heaviness of the songs.

Of course, a record of such scope and ambition cannot be without faults. So, first off, the production/mixing is at time questionable, since it upfronts the orchestral parts and pretty much buries everything else. Also, the drumming lacks in the punch and bottom-end department and the same can be said about the guitars, while some times the orchestral parts pretty much drown the vocals. I, for one, cannot find the least problem with the music in here, but I can easily understand why someone might be put off by the orchestration, as, to a novice of Sigh’s stylistic devices, it can become a problem. Anyway, bottom line is that if one likes his thrash/black metal liberally peppered with orchestral mania, if one doesn’t shy away from crazy-ass experimentation, then one is ready for “Scenes From Hell”. Of course, one has to always remember the sign above Hell’s entrance:

“Lasciate Ogni Speranza, Voi Ch’ Entrate“

- Information
- Released: 2010
- Label: The End Records
- Website: www.sighjapan.com
- Band
- Mirai Kawashima: vocals, keyboards, orchestrations
- Dr. Mikannibal: alto saxophone, vocals
- Satoshi Fujinami: bass
- Shinichi Ishikawa: guitar
- Junichi Harashima: drums

- Tracklist
- 01. Prelude to the oracle
- 02. L’art de mourir
- 03. The soul grave
- Musica In Tempora Belli
- 04. The red funeral
- 05. The summer funeral
- 06. Musica in tempora belli
- 07. Vanitas
- 08. Scenes from Hell