Lacrimosa Album: “Fassade”

When I heard the album for the first time I was just speechless. This is a trip trough music. This is a trip trough your own life!

This album is great. This is metal combined with classical music and with operatic pieces. The music is so emotional, so melodramatic. I have also never heard a voice like the voice of the male-singer. It's haunting, it's complete. This album will make you think, this album will make you cry, this album will tear you apart.

So Lacrimosa brings in the electric guitar on this one. While this is not necessarily a bad thing, it is also not necessarily a good thing. This album, for me, is almost on par with Echos, but sometimes with the guitar, it gets a bit much.

The opening track, Fassade's first movement, is amazing. The choral arrangements, the simple guitar chords, coupled with Anne's awesome keyboard skills make for a wonderful sound. Lacrimosa is at the top of the game when it comes to composition, and this track alone proves it.

"Der Morgan Danach" is the single, and it's great as well.

In fact, all the songs are great until you get to the second movement of Fassade. There's nothing really wrong with this track...it's just too minimalistic for my tastes. Too simple. Not what I would expect from a band known for doing complicated arrangements like Lacrimosa. Then there's "Liebesspiel". Not a bad song, if this were a German grunge band. I suppose the fact that they pull it off indicates that they are multi-talented, but this is just too Rammsteinish for my taste. Last complaint is "Stumme Worte", which again is not bad, but is too simple.

The third movement at the end is, however, enough to offset all these complaints, as are the first few tracks. Lacrimosa is a band everyone should at least check out. What they accomplish is amazing on all their albums, and this still remains worthy of a five star rating. If you can find it, though, get Satura, and definitely get Echos as well. Unless you're into the grungier side of the band, in which case this album is definitely for you.

After I became a huge Lacrimosa fan after hearing Stille, I anxiously awaited delving into the rest of their catalogue. I asked around on the Internet for a recommendation. The overwhelming response indicated that Fassade was their best album.

As my rating would indicate, I was disappointed. The elements that I thought were well-portioned in their other work seemed overblown in this one, namely the long, slow orchestral sections and dramatic romantic themes. Going off of the reviews here and elsewhere, it seems this is what many of their fans actually like. Personally, I missed the exquisite symphonic metal synthesis, large tonal landscapes blending with hard metal thrashings, and more ambiguous and reflective ideas of their other songs. It struck me as more mature, more artistically relevant.

It's still a decent album. The title track has some haunting sections intermixed with aggressive distorted responses. Der Morgen Danach and Liebesspiel were well-written tunes reminiscent of the aforementioned synthesis they perform so well. Otherwise, Fassade drones on with heavy-handed themes in both music and lyrics. Echoes went even further in this direction, and I could only listen to that album once.

But given other fans' love of these qualities, I'm sure I'll catch some flack for this. I'm just glad Lacrimosa returned to form in Lichtgestalt, which is second only to the masterpieces of Stille and Elodia in my book.

I first listened to Elodia, and was blown away by how well it was. When I received Fassade and listened it for the first time, I could instantly tell it wasn't as good as Elodia. Even the single, 'Der Morgen Danach' seems slightly lackluster. In Fassade, the symphonics move a little to the side, and the electric guitars move in. This makes Fassade a lot harder sounding than Elodia. There's nothing really new on Fassade, so it basically sounds like a harder, more metallic version of Elodia.

Don't get this CD first. Get Elodia first, and when you do, you'll see how much better it is than Fassade.

THIS BAND IS WONDERFUL.GREAT IMAGE.GREAT SOUND.UNIQUE DESIGN WITH THE COVER OF THE CDS.A GREAT ROCK GOTHIC CLASSICAL BAND.TRULY ORIGINAL.