Tot Licht – “In fear of the light” album review
Music anomalies and psychosises are valuable phenomenons for any post-punk/death-rock/batcave/coldwave fan, but in this case I want to tell you about a band, which considers itself as Darkwave. «In the fear of the Light» is the third release of an Italian band Tot Licht; as well as their compatriots Frozen Autumn, the band plays darkwave keeping creative heritage of the 80-s music, but that is the only resemblance of the two bands, at least because there is New wave/New Romantic musical base of Frozen Autumn, in distinguish from Batcave/Post-Punk base of Tot Licht. In the beginning of the review I’ve mentioned about anomalies and psychosises, these are the exact words, which come to my mind when I listen to “In Fear Of The Light”, what, believe me, occurs often, though I’m not fond of Darkwave. It worth saying, it’s very difficult for me to put in the same line experimental, psychedelic (by qualities, not by genre) music of Tot Licht with what is called now schvarz-scene of which I’m bored with, because “In The Fear Of The Light” is a vanguard music.
The next thing I want to say about is minimalism, and in this case, minimalism isn’t a drawback, but a huge advantage, which is reached by the means of different complicated components. All the tracks of the release are short, the longest one is “Ario” which lasts 2 minutes 42 seconds, but, thanks to this laconism, we have the entire picture contradicting to musical and atmospheric variety. Except interesting rhythmical and electro parts you can hear guitar and bass, sounding in the 80-s style and combining with the musical pattern. Vocal parts are considered to be attractive and important element. You can hear male vocals and female back-vocals on the “In Fear of the Light”, the male ones are rather emotional and remind the best Batcave singers, it marks mood created on the album and it changes from calm to hysterical, which is pleasant. Female back-vocals can’t be called an angel voice; the girl sings the second part after the leading pattern, making a very oppressive and schizophrenic atmosphere.
In conclusion we have a vanguard band Tot Licht , with a worth listening release, if you want comparisons, I strongly recommend this to all admirers of Alien Sex Fiend, Virgin Prunes, Strange Walls, early Das Ich and Leakh (of “Et Cetera” period), but in fact the comparisons are given just for some kind of identification of the musical features and I’m not afraid to seem unoriginal saying that music of Tot Licht is unique and keeps the most worthy traditions at the same time.
Vadim ‘Bars-Ursula’ Barsov
“Grave Jibes Fanzine”
