Superstition: Cat. # 82833-2
Released June 1998

Track List:
1. The Train Of Thought V. 0.9 (2:16)
2. The Train Of Thought V. 1.1 (6:58)
3. Go Fishing (8:25)
4. Cellular (9:21)
5. The Blaxone (7:43)
6. Rotation (7:40)
7. 88 (7:00)
8. Freakz (6:04)
9. Hellfire (7:14)
10. Deep Blue (9:28)


IN BRIEF: The heart of Lieb’s darkness.

Oliver Lieb had done it! After half a decade of much critical but little commercial success, he’d finally produced a track that would get played out by trance DJs for years to come. Netherworld gave him the spotlight, won him a legion of new fans, and would earn him decent royalties as the track would go on to be featured on many DJ mix compilations and updated remix packages. It would be so easy for him to rest on those laurels, continue re-hashing Netherworld, and ride the burgeoning trance wave into the sunset. Except that’s not what happened.

Seeing the forthcoming commercialization of the genre he helped pioneer, Lieb gave the masses the finger and took his L.S.G. moniker in the completely opposite direction of epic anthems. His Black Series was not meant for those who’d just discovered trance as it was getting super-popular, but for those who’d stuck it out during the unforgiving underground years. It was his way of weeding out the L.S.G. bandwagoners, whom would come expecting more Netherworlds.

Well, that’s my theory, anyway.

Truthfully, all of that paragraph is just speculation. I think very few know exactly why Lieb took L.S.G. into unfriendly underground territories just as trance was blowing up all over Europe. Was it a knee-jerk reaction to the commercialization of the genre he fostered? Or perhaps he just decided to do a little experimenting? Probably only he knows for certain, but as a man who has always done exactly what he wants, I’m sure he had a very good reason for it. He’d probably quaintly answer you if you asked, although it is admittedly more fun to speculate.

Yes, The Black Album isn’t the most accessible CD. The tracks contained on here come from a string of vinyls known as The Black Series, and are arranged into a continuous mix. However, because the songs on those vinyls were strictly intended for the dancefloor, this creates a difficult album to sit back to.

What’s on it, then? Tech-trance, but only the most aggressive, unrelenting sort. This isn’t the kind of stuff you’d hear from guys like Marco V or Sander van Doorn; Lieb’s material eats their tracks as a midnight snack and takes a second helping without asking. You’ll find scant traces of any kind of melody, and usually only in a warped fashion. It’s primal, it’s feral, it’s predatory. To use a current cheesy yet popular internet meme, The Black Album is the Chuck Norris of tech-trance.

Wisely, Lieb opens the album up with The Train Of Thought, as it has the closest thing approaching a melody (the 0.9 version is just an ambient-ish intro). Amongst murky, mechanical rhythms, a pulse of spacey synth pierces the unsettling atmosphere every so often. Various effects tweak it throughout, distorting its resonance as the song progresses. There is no real conventional structure to The Train Of Thought, simply building upon layers of sound to raise the intensity of the track. It certainly is an entrancing bit of music but, if you find it not to your taste, you might want to seek other pastures; the tech influences only get stronger from here.

Go Fishing offers a clearer taste of what’s to come. Although the blasting distorted sirens, eerie effects, and synthetic pads could be construed as hooks, they don’t offer much in melody. Rather, they’re there to accentuate the driving mechanical rhythms as layer upon layer of loops keep building this track’s intensity. Yeah, it’s quite similar to Train Of Thought in structure, but far less benign in nature.

From here, any notion of detailing the rest of The Black Album in our usual method just flies out the window. Every track melds into each other, and, although you can usually tell when a different song is playing, it isn’t easy listening as there’s very little in terms of conventional hooks or melodies. And the sounds Lieb creates? Forget it. I don’t think there are any proper metaphors in my vocabulary to do them justice. The drone of a starship reactor; industrial strength clangs and clonks; brief bits of sputtering, distorted acid squelches; cyborg jembe drummers; splashes of bright synth; growling Imperial AT-ATs; demonic screams; radioactive chemicals boiling in huge factory vats; Unicron having a tummy ache; wraith-like wails; whatever else you may have. All this and more can be heard through tracks Cellular to Freakz, and it can be an unsettling experience if you succumb to the madness of it all.

The remarkable thing about all this is, despite the relative inaccessibility of these tracks, they are still amazingly seductive. Lieb has paid an incredible amount of attention to his rhythms, hooking you into their mesmerizing dance. All these menacing sound effects throughout are there to provide a primal backdrop, grabbing your primitive brain so the rhythms can overwhelm you. And with each successive track laying down the rhythms harder and fiercer, the intensity of this album just continuously escalates with no end in sight.

The final two tracks, Hellfire and Deep Blue, might trick you into thinking you’ll find some solace, as spacey synthy washes rather than menacing sounds provide the atmosphere. Alas for the weak at heart, Lieb shows no mercy, cranking his rhythms into overdrive in his rush to the finish. Hellfire is a hypnotizing cacophony of percussion while Deep Blue unleashes his fiercest kicks yet. You’ll only escape the madness of this once the droning, synthetic pads of Deep Blue finally recede.

Madness. Absolutely yes, The Black Album could cause madness if you let it. This is not something for throwing on while lounging about home enjoying tea and crumpets. The music on here is simply designed to pummel logic and reason into submission and let pure instinct take over. And this, my friends, can frighten many people. We do not readily enjoy losing control of our sensibilities, letting the animal within us to override our judgement. As such, the music on here will just come across as irritating noise if you merely play it in the background, your logic center uncaring towards what’s going on since the music defies what we typically expect out of trance, much less music in general. The entire middle section can easily pass you by without anything leaping out for your attention.

It may be a music journalistic cliché to say this, but The Black Album really is an album that demands your undivided attention, preferably while in the process of doing something active to get your adrenaline going (I recommend dancing, but working out, running, driving, or sexing can probably do in a pinch). I wouldn’t exactly say you’ll be rewarded for such attentiveness though, as you may not feel comfortable in where it’ll take you. Still, it will certainly not be a trip you’ll likely forget.

ACE TRACKS:
The Train Of Thought 1.1
Hellfire


Written by Sykonee for TranceCritic.com. May not be reproduced or republished without the consent of TranceCritic.com. All rights reserved.

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Title: L.S.G. - The Black Album
Category: Album
Sub Category: Trance
Reviewer: Sykonee
Added: May 3rd 2006
Viewed: 1573 Times
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