Sigh -- 'Imaginary Sonicscape' reissue [review]

Sigh - Imaginary Sonicscape [Reissue]
The End Records (1/20/09)
Heavily orchestrated metal / Hard rock / Classic rock / Jazz, etc.

Japanese metal outfit Sigh is most often billed as a black-metal band. Sure, 2007’s fantastic Hangman’s Hymn could easily be compared to, say, Dimmu Borgir, but the band is far from a one-trick pony. In 2001, they released a sonic stew of various metal elements, heavily orchestrated with elements of several other genres thrown in for good measure. There’s jazz, hard rock, ’80s thrash, pseudo-disco beats, synthesizers galore, classic rock...

That album was called Imaginary Sonicscape, and perhaps an album title has never been quite so apropos. This reissue of the 2001 underground classic, courtesy of The End Records, includes bonus tracks not available on the original release, including an extended version of “Bring Back the Dead”.

There’s really no way to truly do this album justice in a review. Instead, here are some tidbits of what the band has to offer:

- The album kicks off innocently enough, with "Corpsecry/Angelfall", a straight-ahead thrasher, chock-full of enough synth riffs to make Dragonforce jealous. But the track abruptly cuts out to give way to gorgeous, epic orchestration that sounds more like a score to some Oscar-contending movie.

- "Nietzschean Conspiracy" relies heavily on sampling and sound effects, with the lead singer channeling the soul of Rammstein as he barks over (or perhaps under) atmospheric, spacey beats and jazzy keyboarding.

- What better to break up two genre-bending songs than with a killer piano solo? It would appear nothing, as the one-and-a-half minute "Impromptu" makes a quick little appearance before giving way to the opening riffs of "Dreamsphere" (right out of the mid-’80s, I might add).

- The heavily orchestrated "Voices" is a new track this time around, and once again Sigh explores a more score-based approach, with some nice piano work closing out the seven-plus minutes.

There are a few tracks in which the band pushes, or in one case exceeds, the 10-minute mark, and for the most part, that’s where Sigh really shines. Using five or six different elements in a three- or five-minute song can come across as forced, but on a song like "Bring Back the Dead", the band can meander a little without losing overall focus. On the other hand, on the behemoth "Slaughtergarden Suite" (five parts stretching to almost 11 minutes in length), the band almost doesn’t do enough to vary things up. In actually listening to the song, it's surprising just how fast it passes, but the closing minutes are a bit of a grind, with some nice keyboarding playing under the hiss of vinyl.

Overall, this is pretty avant-garde music. It’s much less schizophrenic than, say, Between the Buried and Me, and much less abrasive to that end, as well. No, this is much more accessible, provided the listener is willing to throw any preconceived notions out the window. Imaginary Sonicscape is an enjoyable journey through sound, and one of those rare "experience" albums where the whole is much greater than the sum of its parts. Not quite as off-the-wall as some other reviewers would have you believe, a lot of music fans can find something to love on here. Don’t let that "black metal" stamp scare you off. (Oh, and by the way, despite the band hailing from Japan, all lyrics are sung in English.)