Musical Morgue Review: Carnival Arcane by Midnight Syndicate
Listen up Deadites! Gruesome Joe here with the latest installment of the Musical Morgue right here on Rotting Flesh Radio.
This week, I’ve got an album so hot off the press, it hasn’t even been available for a full week yet. I’m talking about the one and only Midnight Syndicate and their 14th studio album Carnival Arcane. The CD just came out earlier this week, it is the bands first carnival or circus themed album, and I think was well worth the wait.
The album takes us back to the turn of the century, to the Lancaster-Rigby Carnival, where things are not quite what they seem. With 25 great tracks, Midnight Syndicate leaves very little ground uncovered, as they take the listener through the freakshow, into the mirror maze, to the fortune teller, on a carousel ride, and more. There really isn’t an avenue they didn’t explore with this CD. You can tell the immense amount of planning that went into this disc, because the CD plays with its own storyline—it’s not simply a collection of songs with a common theme. They literally pull us through the guts of this horrible carnival and in the end, we don’t know if we’ve made it out alive, or if we’ve become a permanent fixture in the circus itself.
Edward Douglas and Gavin Goszka both have done a tremendous job with this album integrating very cool ambient environments into the actual music. I actually think this is one of the best parts of this new album—this CD, much like other Midnight Syndicate albums, has a very movie-soundtrack feel. But this album takes it one step further, especially with the way it has been produced. It actually sounds like these recordings were taken from scenes in a movie. They’ve incorporated actor voiceovers, lots of ambient sound effects, really slick mixing and mastering, and have paired tracks together to create a series of vignettes within the 25 tracks, that I think all contribute to the cohesive carnival storyline. That’s not to say that any track on this disc couldn’t stand alone—because they all very easily could. But it’s that continually evolving musical story that has caught my ear, and I think has raised the bar for Midnight Syndicate yet again.
With 25 tracks (well, maybe 26 if you listen closely… hehehe) there is no possible way I can give you Deadites a preview of each of them like I have in the past. So what I’d like to do to give you a good feel for the album is to highlight a few of my favorites. The first of which has to be the very first track on the album, “Mesonoxian Visitors.” This track quite literally brings the circus into town and begins the madness.
(“Mesonoxian Visitors” clip)
One of my favorite things about this album is how well Ed and Gavin have mixed in ambient sounds and effects to create incredibly awesome soundscapes. I think “Mesonoxian Visitors” in particular is a perfect beginning to the disc by showing off their skills and introducing you to their style. Later on in the album, Ed and Gavin utilized ambience-only, or minimally musical, tracks to further the ambient qualities of the album and give us some really sinister work. Tracks such as “Cheval Glass” and “Sea of Laughter” come to mind here.
(“Cheval Glass” and “Sea of Laughter” clips)
The thing I most enjoyed about this album was how the tracks have been arranged to fall into a naturally progressing storyline. They’ve paired track together such as “Madame Zora,” a predominantly ambient track with a voiceover, and the track “Agent of Fortune” to build small vignettes for your ear, but maintain the effective usefulness of the two separate pieces. If you were running a haunted house and wanted the ambient voiceover, you wouldn’t need to cut the track yourself—Ed and Gavin have already done that one for you. Conversely, if you wanted to use a track in your ‘mystic room’ then there’s no need to cut the opening voiceover out—it’s already done. I like that they’ve taken into consideration the usefulness of their tracks within the haunt industry, knowing how to present pieces to their fans that they’ll easily incorporate into their haunted houses. The later half of the album is particularly good at this concept, because track after track are all specific to a particular area of a circus or carnival, so the usefulness of the album as a whole is tremendous.
One of my favorite tracks on the album has to be the 15th track on the album, “Carousel Ride.” I love how this track gradually decays and the incorporation of sound effects becomes greater as the track progresses. We start off with a very clean, old sounding carousel accompaniment, but as the track wears on, the evil behind the ride comes into full light.
(“Carousel Ride” clip)
There were several tracks on this album that I feel strayed from the more traditional “Midnight Syndicate Sound” than I would have expected. I in no way mean that as a bad thing—long time listeners of Midnight Syndicate have become accustomed to their signature sound. Huge strings, pounding tympani’s, it all contributes to the very epic nature of Midnight Syndicate music. I find this new style to be incredibly exciting, and I think the musicality of both Ed and Gavin expanded greatly with this album. The tracks “Under the Big Top” and “Agent of Fortune” come instantly to mind here. They’re both much brighter, bouncier tunes than I would have expected from Midnight Syndicate, but that maintain that signature Midnight Syndicate sound. Here’s a quick clip from the two:
(“Under the Big Top” and “Agent of Fortune” clips)
Keeping with that fun nature, there’s a great track on the album called “Dr. Atmore’s Elixirs of Good Humour and Fortification” that I absolutely love. It’s a ridiculously fun track, and yet again makes me wish I had been a traveling “Doctor” of sorts in the day selling my bottles of… well… whatever I had on hand.
(“Dr. Atmore’s…” clip)
The first half of the album does really well at establishing the circus vibe as well as developing the very mystical themes of the CD. The later half provides a very wide selection of tracks that are each focused on one particular element of the circus. Tracks such as “Freakshow,” “Pulling the Strings,” “Goons & Greasepaint,” “Kiddieland,” and “Krellsig’s Kastle of Fun” all contribute to the various different scenes you might find at an old carnival. All of these tracks use lots of ambient sound effects and voiceovers paired up with distinct musical compositions that further enhance the complete track. The best of which (I think!) is “Goons & Greasepaint.” I bet within just a few moments of listening to this track, you’ll know where this one is going…
(“Goons & Greasepaint” clip)
Overall, I think this is an absolutely tremendous album by Midnight Syndicate and I’m going to give it a full 5 out of 5 skulls. I find all of the compositions to be quite perfect for the subject matter of the track, and find that all of the ambient qualities and effects mixing are done in a way that really enhances the atmosphere of the tracks without sounding forced or contrived. I also like that Midnight Syndicate has maintained their epic signature sound, but have continued to grow musically and have offered up several tracks are noticeably out of their comfort zone, but that are equally as effective and sound awesome.
I highly recommend you pick up a copy of this CD for your collection or for your own haunted attraction, especially if you have any circus or carnival themed areas. I think that this CD blows all of the other circus haunt music CD’s out there completely out of the water. If you’re looking to get away from all the oom-pa-pa and calliope sounding CD’s, then this is exactly what you’ve been looking for.
You can pick up a copy of Carnival Arcane on the band’s website right now at MidnightSyndicate.com, as well as on iTunes, Amazon.com, or at select Hot Topic stores starting August 8. The album will also be available starting in September at seasonal Halloween retailers such as Halloween Express and Halloween City, but I recommend you pick up your copy well before then.
Well Deadites, that about does it for this week here in the Morgue. Be sure to check out GruesomeJoe.com to check out the written version of my review, as well as all the links to buy the album directly from Ed and Gavin at MidnightSyndicate.com. I’m Gruesome Joe and I’ll be chilling out here in the Morgue, waiting for you… until next time…
