Season of Tears
IHow Hard
She’s Dead
Ego
Insomnia
Divided
Obscura Lua
The Bar
Delhi
Rêve Éveillé
Silencio

Cold Meat Industry continues its branching out of style from its vast bulk of ambient and industrial noise into realms of ethereal classical and pop and Olen’k is perhaps the most divergent of the lot to date.

Compressing classical into modern form is but one aspect of the album’s repertoire and immediately the album strikes after verse one of being something more than another neoclassical female-led foray. The songwriting is well crafted, twisting what could be anticipated progressions into pleasant resolutions. The dichotomous intertwine of the female vocal duo, Elise Montastier and Cécile Gonzales, is the compelling drive behind the album.

From the swaying trip-hop tribal rhythms of “How Hard” to the gothic tread of “She’s Dead” with its Cure/Pornography punctiliousness, the duo find unique correlation for each and every track complimenting each other flawlessly. That is not to say the pair dominate the album with the music falling by the wayside, the instrumentation has a sinuous vigour and luxuriant mix that knits tightly into a cohesive whole. Electronic rhythms thrum intoxicatingly amidst panoply of shadowed sequencing and samples into an ethnic amalgamation much like CMI label-mate, Sanctum’s own fane of industrialised unification; though Olen’k fall more on the side of the world music than the mechanical.

The packaging is tastefully archaic and ethnic with eight-page gloss booklet replete with full lyric sheet with artwork in brushed abstract style riddled with cultural appendage.

NYR