Theatre of Tragedy Album: “Theatre Of Tragedy”

The only problem I have with this album is that the production is terrible! Listen to the excellent sound quality of Aegis and then put this one in! It's truly depressing! Problems I've found with the production of this CD are: the bass is very flat, Liv Kristine's voice is turned down too low, and the piano isn't as full as it could be (it sounds like someone held a microphone over it instead of actually plugging it into the mixing board). It'd be cool if they re-released this album with better production. It's a tragedy to have amazing songs such as A Hamlet for a Slothful Vassal and To these words I beheld no Tongue and have them produced badly! Please, don't get me wrong! This CD is worth every penny! It's a must if you're a fan of atmospheric, doomy, and intelligently written music! It'd just be nice to have it produced better, you know?

The music is sad, and depressing at times but the vocals growl, and the guitars riff grind, and the drums blast away, and at the sametime the female vocals so pretty you mite forget its a doom group! fans of cathedral and paramaecium and paradise lost will love it to death!

Theatre of Tragedy's self-titled is their best work aside from Aegis, in my humble opinion. Anything after Aegis is pure trash, as we all know, and Velvet Darkness They Fear is pretty bland after a few listens. But the band's debut is pretty darn good. The use of cello on a few songs, combined with excellent piano pieces, really adds to the flavor. Theatre of Tragedy never did anything spectacular with their guitars, except distort or downtune the hell out of them to make them sound 'heavy,' but hey it all works out. "Sweet Art Thou" has one of the best intros I've ever heard, and at only 3:58, it should've been a precedent on where TOT and other 'doom' metal bands ended their songs. I hate these nine-minute draggers that have one chord and one riff, and cheesy synth effects (I'm referring to bands like Ashes You Leave and TSOTB, not TOT), so at least Raymond and company knew when to end a song. The growls are good as usual, although a little too heavily distorted. Liv's voice is okay, nothing special. Lyrically it's pretty good, especially if you like Shakespearean poetry. I highly recommend this and Aegis if you want to hear good Theatre of Tragedy. I still think Tristania (at least in the Veland era) is a million times better... sorry TOT worshippers.

This is TOT in the days before they, like Samael, sucummbed to some weird fascination with electronica and ruined it for everyone. A nice mix of male growls and female soprano vocals over some nice if not overly complex riffs. (I always feel like the focus in these sorts of bands in on the vocals and keys anyway, so impressive guitarwork is almost a bonus.) I don't feel like it is as memorable as some Tristania or Sins of Thy Beloved, but for anyone who has not yet heard TOT or is just looking for another addition to his/her collection of gothic metal, this is a good purchase. By the way, as a side note, I did my phd comps in Renaissance literature, and the lyrics are definitely not in some Shakespearian English, as some reviewers say. It's really pretty much nonsense. So I recommend just sitting back and enjoying the music.

There is some great music, lots of talent, and a great female singer in this goth or Beauty & the Beast metal band. The male Beast grunts or conflict singing ruins it for me. If you like those male grunts alot then you should love this album, but I may not be able to stand it much and may have to put it down, or let it go as a flying frisbee. I give it 3 stars because I have not given up yet on being able to tolerate the grunts. If I lose that battle then the album is less than one star for me, in fact it will be gone as far as I can throw it.