Label: Dark Symphonies

Tracks:

1. The Blue Ghost / Shedding Qliphoth 7:57
2. They Aren't All Beautiful 5:36
3. Heaven And Weak 7:43
4. The (Sign of the) Four 1:38 (instrumental)
5. The Ferryman 7:51
6. Marid's Gift of Art 3:42
7. Girl With a Watering Can 8:44
8. Birth Pains of Astral Projection 10:35
9. The (Sign of the) Nine 2:13 (instrumental)
10. Geography 5:01

Musicians:

• Jason Bitner - trumpet
• Byron - vocals, keyboards, percussion
• Toby Driver - vocals, guitar, bass, keyboards, cello, percussion
• Mara-Stella Fountolakis - vocals
• Sam Gutterman - vocals, drums percussion, guitar
• Greg Massi - vocals, guitar
• Nicholas Kyte - bass
• Terran Olson - vocals, keyboards, clarinet, flute, percussion
• Josh Seipp-Williams - guitar

Attention to this surprising band because are a bet of strong present and encouraging future, in the present progressive scene.

Leaded by the multi-instrumentist Toby Driver, maudlin of the Well are an unique band. They are Americans but have scandinavian sound, and propose us something fascinante and different to what we can find in the current progressive and metal scene. They combine dark Scandinavian progressive rock, doom metal, gothic sounds, acoustic folky passages, chamber music, jazz and many ambient atmospheres, and can please equally to the fans of Anathema, White Willow, Opeth, Lacrimosa, Sonic Youth, Godspeed You! Black Emperor or Porcupine Tree, among many other groups.

In spite of publishing its albums in a label dedicated to quite more metallic groups, and to some quite hard fragments and accelerated, I think sincerely that this is more progressive than anything else, and above all the form in which they express and play, has quite more relation with progressive rock than no other styles.

It is very difficult to describe the music of these guys, so it includes a large variety of styles and a quantity of different fascinating emotions, being strolled with mastery by paths that go from the delicacy and instrumental beauty to the aggressiveness and filth. Where besides the orchestration is absolutely brilliant and precise, full of shades and details, created by an assembly of nine musicians whose instruments go from the typical guitars, basses, pianos, synthesisers, mellotrons and drums, to other less conventional as are trumpets, cellos, church organs, saxes, clarinets and flutes.

The line-up include three lead vocalists, two male, one of clean voice, the leader Toby Driver, and a grunt vocalist, Byron, who doesn't participate in many occasions, so I think it may not be a problem for the detractors of this type of singers. The other voice is female, and really beautyfoul, by Mara-Stella Fountolakis, a Greek girl of origin.

After a debut album appeared in 1999, motW presented us a double release in 2001, two twin albums released simultaneously, this "Bath" and "Leaving your Body Map" which I review aside, although really the two albums form a unit.

In this album, if we except "They Aren't All Beautiful", the only track totally of death-doom metal style, with grunt vocals, the remainder are very varied. Tracks full of many kinds of sounds, as I already said, ambient, metallic, folkies, symphonic, jazzies, gothic, etc, emphasizing for my taste "Girl With a Watering Can", "Birth Pains of Astral Projection", with a start that seems Pink Floyd, "The Ferryman" and "Geography".

It is not an easy band to digest, one must go into them slowly, and above all one must have the open mind to be able to come to enjoy its music in all its splendor. It isn't a matter of an collection of radiophonic songs that quickly you memorize, but an almost mystical experience in which you discover somewhat new in each listening.

Rating: 8.5/10

Ferran Lizana