Germ – Loss
Germ is a bi-polar side project of Tim, also known for his work in Austere, who’s obvious love for the theatrical spills over into his craft. Germ maintains a symphonic black metal essence, lead by dominant synth lines that act as the main “riffs” for most of these tracks, while the guitars take a back seat with their dissonant, full chord picking style. The keyboards are moving, yet lack depth in favor of simplistic, though catchy melodies that sound as if they were executed with one finger. The overly fake drums, clean vocal style and synthetic outward presentation of this album introduces and nurtures strong pop connotations, which is evidently an interest for the artist as he writes pop music for bigger record labels as his regular job. This is painfully evident on the jangly bubblegum pop song “Only When Every Timepiece in the World is Smash”, ripe with “ohhhh yeeeaaahhh” and wispy thin vocal lines that would dampen an entire arena of panties given the opportunity. I’m all for cross-genre experimentation, but when this style attempts to climb into bed with a stylistically well groomed and rocking form of “black metal” as on the song “Cold Grey Dawn (A New Beginning), along with processed “crying Orc” screams ala Burzum, the union makes for an awkward and unappreciated lovechild. There is a definitely memorable strand spun throughout the course of “Loss” due to the pop-sensibilities of Tim’s writing style, and I would even go as far to point out that this project sounds like a weaker and “happier” attempt at Alcest worship. Neige really doesn’t have anything to worry about here. Neither do you. -Marty
Eisenwald
Worm Gear 