The name of The Tenth Stage means the imagined tenth circle of Dante’s Inferno and was born from two people’s common work. One of them is John Von Ahlen coming from Subterrane Studios, who, among other things, assisted at the last Tankt album (Club Life) with the recording of the vocal tracks. I think the friendship has started here, because the other member, Roberto Massaglia, who gives his voice to the project, is coming from this great melodic EBM-electro band, which now can be classified broken up. They have also cooperated with a list of contributors: for example Ian Burden (ex-The Human League), Charles Fenech (Angel Theory, but his appearance is not surprising at all) or Karl Learmont (Angelspit) are among them and the result is more than surprising.

That is, the point of the conception cannot be attached to a genre. Because each song of the album can be connected to a theatrical scene mostly, what is more, in a bohemian horror theatre. Murder, zombies, little girl playing with knives, cannibalism (this last one occurs suspiciously frequently by the way) and many other nice things make up the core of the circle of the chosen subjects. The irony and the grotesque accomplishes in the musical part: the composers have asked the help of many branches of pop music beyond the massive darkwave base and have nicely inserted the tools used generally for love hymns or other facile themes of the world into this dark environment. So this is how the morbid caricature of the subject and the rendering was born, which even the dub-raggie is not unfamiliar with (the brilliant Sweet Jenny have to be mentioned here). The guys have accomplished all these with the use of both digital and analogue instruments, beside excellent production quality. The album sounds dynamically, but it is true that the volume has pumped up pretty much – fortunately not that much that could perceptibly spoil the sounding of the components and though the tins are too much emphasized for me, the piano sounds beautifully for example.

I intentionally have not detailed so much the musical influences, everybody has to discover this unusual album of the scene for himself (you can listen to longer excerpts from all the songs on the official website). It is worth being patient because the main point of the album is placed exactly in the middle, the thrilling Maman Marie’s Dance is one of the best pieces and the listener may really like this album after this. A particularly interesting track is Criminal World, which is a cover of the scandalous 1977 song of the proto-new wave Metro (which the audience may be familiar with from David Bowie’s interpretation). The second LP, Grand Guignol, is being made with full speed and after such a start I really cannot imagine what else may burst out from the heads of these two not completely normal Australians!


SUMMARY: 8/10 – An entirely unusual work, but it is one that you can love.

TRACKLIST:
01. The Tenth Stage 02. The Hangman Retribution 03. Wolf Call 04. Banquet For Eight (Macquarie Harbour 1822) 05. Francois Martin 06. Mary Rose 07. Maman Marie’s Dance 08. Storage Problem (The Dilemma Of Pogo) 09. Sweet Jenny 10. St. Giles In The Fields (1665 AD) 11. The Lady Of The House 12. Criminal World 13. I Never Promised You A Rose Garden 14. Epilogue

LINKS:
The Tenth Stage
Crash Frequency