ELUVEITIE - Ategnatos (2019)

Finally getting around to this.  We're back in metal-land with the new guys and gals fully incorporated into the band.  Sticking with the reported spirit of collaboration, Jonas Wolf (again - JONAS. WOLF.  Still such a metal name...) is credited with production help and gets just tons of songwriting credits, including getting listed before Chigrel on occasion.  Most of the others pitch in here and there too as co-writers, but it's mostly Chigrel and Jonas.  Here's what they come up with on the band's longest release to date.

Track One:  "Ategnatos"

Oh great, more Andrew narration.  At least it's brief.  An appealing flute figure that'll pop up a few times on this record* (and in our first bit of "this sounds like that other song," it sounds a lot like the tune also used as the basis for "The Nameless" - no wonder I keep wanting to sing "holy father in darkness" instead of the actual lyrics) leads us into an appealing Fabienne-led chant of "Ategnatos Eluveitie."  It takes a certain chutzpah to actually basically call your record "Eluveitie Reborn."  I like that "Ategnatos" is a real song rather than just an intro, and I like the main solid thrashy riff once the metal guitars kick in.  However the vocal part (for both singers) is just kinda there.  I keep wanting this rebirth to be a little more exciting than it is.

Track Two:  "Ancus"

Oh, okay, here's our nothing linking track.  Got it.

Track Three:  "Deathwalker"

Now we're talking.  I love this one.  The interplay of the hurdy and guitar on the main riff is classic Eluveitie, but the vocal melody is somehow special.  Chigrel does a thing where he slowly enunciates the end of phrases to make them hit hard and I find that both the verses and the choruses click.  That chorus with Chigrel and Fabienne together is magical how well their voices pair, leading to the dropped post-climax beat of "...nor did I mourn" that's the best leftover beat since "...enfolding you."  Love both of those string parts during the bridge too.  Maybe it's the flapping black wings imagery, but that's going to be my comparison point:  "Deathwalker" is "Quoth The Raven"-level good, whilst not sounding quite like any previous Eluveitie song.  Thrilled that this band can still make me grin the first time I hear a song; my smile hasn't faded on a bunch of repeat listens.  (But seriously, narrators, please quit interrupting my songs with your bullshit!)

Track Four:  "Black Water Dawn"

Grew a little more slowly on me than "Deathwalker."  No mistake, though, BWD is another winner, with another killer vocal melody.  Here Chigrel takes the verses and Fabienne the choruses and they seem to be reaching out for each other, melodically speaking, like the characters reaching/sailing across the life/death divide that they're singing about.  Giving the main riff to the violin adds to that feeling of longing.

This song's guitar solo is the closest to Kirk Hammett that Rafael has ever sounded.

Track Five:  "A Cry In The Wilderness"

I don't really get the lyrics here.  Chigrel at least sounds good singing it - seriously, the way he modulates his pronunciation to make the phrases sound conversational while emphasizing the later syllables is working for him so well across this record.  More harp than usual, even a little audible once everyone else starts playing, although as expected mostly inaudible unless you're looking for it.  Solid album track.

Track Six:  "The Raven Hill"

More ravens.  Always with the ravens...  Anyway, I get that warm feeling of familiarity the moment the main mixed violin/flute/guitar riff starts.  I guess I'd call "The Raven Hill" the closest that Ategnatos gets to a traditional rollicking "Uis Elveti-core" track.  Like the good ones in that category, I find myself wanting to sing along with the Gaulish parts without knowing what I'm saying, so I'll call that a success.  Very effective use of tempo changes to guide the ear to expect the next line.  I wish TRH were longer; it's a good one.

I suppose I should at least mention the repeated lyrical motifs.  I can't say I actually know what story is being told about the voyage, various things coming in threes, the ravens, the portents of Lugos, and so on.  To the extent that there's a narrative, I gather that it's about the Celtic idea of the dead being intrinsically connected with the living, and continuing to exist as part of them.  The repeated phrases across songs help the record feel a little more unified, you know?  Irrespective of whether or not something is a concept album, the sense that the tracks in some way play off each other is generally appreciated in such a long collection of music.

Track Seven:  "The Silvern Glow"

A nice little melody for pipe, harp, and acoustic guitar.  I just see it as an inessential but nice little bridge to Fabienne's big showpiece ballad...

Track Eight:  "Ambiramus"

The main instrumental line that plays over the intro and chorus I find really interesting - the woodwinds are playing staccato notes yet the tune is smooth and lively.  This is another really short song.  The verses are light and pretty, which sound good.  The pre-chorus then drops the tuning into something more rock so that we can then burst into a cathartic Gaulsish chorus with Chigrel growling along a counterpoint.  

Here's the thing.  I like the melody; I do.  My caveat is... well, I may be nitpicking or specifically dissecting elements just because I'm trying to write a review here, but I feel like the chorus puts a vocal echo effect on Fabienne such that it sounds like lik a pop-rock chorus, or even a touch of that sort of metal where you put Disney princess singing over power chords.  Whereas what I want her to be doing is a big powerful hard-rock singer's chorus.  There's nothing inherently wrong with incorporating the lighter sound into Eluveitie, to be clear.  I just am a hard rock guy who likes a certain thing that I wish the song were giving me more of.  

And... going a step further, I have to wonder if the issue is that Fabienne as a rock singer doesn't have quite the same raw vocal pure power as her predecessor.  Her voice has a great earthy, folky tone, and most importantly, pairs well with Chigrel's on the metal songs.  Thing is, though, Anna Murphy can do all those things too, and she can just fucking bellow** when the situation calls for it, like on my beloved "Quoth The Raven."  I've missed her energy in the post-Origins Eluveitie records.***

Sorry about the long digression.  Maybe that belonged in some kind of summary comment, although in describing the experience of listening to the record straight through, this seems like the natural place to talk about the contrast between the backup singers.  Again, do not read as some big condemnation of "Ambiramus" in particular, which I rather like.  Or even of Fabienne, for that matter, who I rather like, and whose rock-style singing we will soon see is at least solid on "Breathe" and "Rebirth."  But it is moments like this when I realize that I miss Anna.  I miss you, Anna!  

Track Nine:  "Mine Is The Fury"

Finally a blatant copycat moment.  "Mine Is The Fury" clearly is an attempt to recapture that "Havoc" magic, right down to the pounding drumbeats and hyperactive violin part on the chorus.  I do chant along to "voracious blaze!  Engulf and erase!" so I guess I like the song.  There's room in my heart for a "Havoc"-alike.  The derivativeness is just especially obvious this time around.

Track Ten:  "The Slumber"

Okay, here's something a little bit different.  After a nice harp intro, Chigrel and Jonas and Alain take over to metal us up... slowly.  Not sure I've heard an Eluveitie song take the form of a death march before - "one foot in front of the other" indeed.****  The mix of militaristic sound and references to dreams and goals leave the listener appropriately ambivalent about whether this particular walk is going to lead its protagonists to something better.  I just wish the chorus where Fabienne comes in weren't such a vocal carbon copy of the title lyric from "The Call Of The Mountains".  It's a nice counterpoint; it's just a nice sound that it feels like we've already heard a bunch of times before from these guys, whereas the rest of the song is something legitimately novel.

Track Eleven:  "Worship"

And something else different, as we dive deeper into the dark side of faith and worship of the primal (and the next song after this one will be about a Samhain thing, so...).  I don't know if this one plays so well to Eluveitie's strengths.  Why is (guest spoken word vocalist) Randy Blythe doing this Revelation-inspired thing on our Celtic record?  Now, the screaming sound effects and chanting parts and dissonant violin passages are reminiscent of the darker moments on the Evocations records.  So I certainly like the idea of introducing those elements into one of their metal song.  I'm not convinced that the way "Worship" combines its different elements really works as a piece of music.  So, best described as an interesting and ambitious failure, I suppose.

Track Twelve:  "Trinoxtion"

Oh, hai, Meri Tadić!  Good to see that at least some former members of the band are still on good terms with Chigrel.  "Trinoxtion" is more music than narration, making it actually not insufferable as a transition track as it sets up "Threefold Death."

Track Thirteen:  "Threefold Death"

Huh.  I'd say of the whole record, "Threefold Death" is the song that my mind still refuses to totally get a handle on.  I certainly find it interesting when listening to, although I instantly forget how it sounds once it ends.  Interesting.  Interesting choice to go with a momentum killing alternation between the plaintive, almost childlike "will you remember me?" parts and the harsh vox expressing concerns about a meaningless death - talk about a journey with an unclear outcome!  It's weird to me; I think I like the track on an intellectual level, whilst going back and forth about it on a musical level.  And that pulsating sound that they make during the bridge that sounds almost like a dance beat... how weird.  And Fabeinne handing over her part of the song to Chigrel at the end... all I can say, over and over, is "interesting."  I don't know quite how much sitting with this track I need, it seems so far it hasn't been enough.

Track Fourteen:  "Breathe"

And here's Fabienne to reassure us that rebirth is indeed coming soon.  Befittingly, this track is a little more of a straightforward rock song.  I've always liked it pretty well, and she does sound good singing in this range.  After about 4:20, the regular song ends and things turn into more of a chant that seems to be derived from the opening "Ategnatos" idea.  Speaking of which...

Track Fifteen:  "Rebirth"

Finally we hear that "Ategnatos" tune in what seems like it ought to be its native form, now with Fabienne singing the words we first heard from Andrew over it.  Serves as an awesome haunting chorus to pair with one of the most straight ahead metal riffs and verses (and solos) of the record.  "Rebirth" was the first single and seems to be this record's equivalent of "King" in that it's a strong song that pretty much summarizes everything that Ategnatos does overall, in one go.  Whilst, also like "King," when listened to in the context of the whole record, it seems like a statement of triumph after everything we've been through.  Especially the part where Chigrel and Fabienne together proclaim themselves to be things like "the grain in the earth" in a device that Genius.com informs me is apparently, as best as we can tell, a distinctive feature of Celtic-era Irish and Welsh poetry.  So, uh, cool!  There's a lot going on in "Rebirth" to keep things interesting.  After a nice summary statement that "this was my rebirth..."

Track Sixteen:  "Eclipse"

..."Rebirth" keeps going, letting Fabienne do a pure folk outro to ensure that that "O bright sun of the night, I lift my eyes to thee," etc, will be stuck in the listener's head for as long as possible.  When you have a chorus like this, you run with it.  I'll take this as an outro track over portentious spoken word bullshit every damn day of the week.

Additional thoughts:

Is Ategnatos a little overlong, and does it maybe lean on some of the same tricks Eluveitie have used in the past?  Sure.  Do I give a shit?  I do not.  Ategnatos is a triumph.  As a music listener who has come to love the particular musical stew that Eluveitie serves up, all I can say is that it sounds like another Eluveitie classic.  This band makes me feel things, and I'm so glad to have them in my life.  I dare anyone to watch the video for "Rebirth," ideally while reading comments.  If you don't come away happy, I don't think there's anything I can do to convince you otherwise. 

Favorite track:  "Deathwalker"

Runner up:  "Rebirth"/"Eclipse" if I'm "allowed" to count them together as one, "Black Water Dawn" if not

Least favorite (actual songs only):  "Worship"

Rating:  4.5/5

Definitive running list of records by Eluveitie and Cellar Darling that I have listened to so far, in order of what I have decided is unambiguously their quality

1)  Origins

2)  Everything Remains (As It Never Was)

3)  Slania

4)  Ategnatos

5)  Helvetios

6)  Spirit

7)  Evocation I - The Arcane Dominion

8)  Evocation II - Pantheon

9)  This Is The Sound [Cellar Darling] 

On to Cellar Darling's The Spell, whenever I get around to it!  And on from there to another Eluveitie odds-and-ends post (covering, among other things, the 2020s non-album singles), whenever I get around to it!

*Reddit claims that the melody that features so prominently in "Ategnatos," "Rebirth," and "Eclipse" comes from "I Am Stretched On Your Grave," a tune composed by the band Scullion as a musical arrangement for an old Irish poem.  ("I Am Stretched On Your Grave" was then in turn covered by Sinéad O'Connor.)  Actually calling up the videos on YouTube, however, tells me that the two melodies have a few notes in common but aren't actually the same song.  *shrug*

 

**I regret in my writeup of Helvetios that I didn't make proper mention of Anna's vocals on "The Siege," in large part because I didn't realize until seeing a live version that she's singing lead, delivering harsh vocals side by side with Chigrel and nailing it.

***Honestly, I wish she pushed her rock vocals harder on the first Cellar Darling record; I miss that energy there too.  Am curious to see what she ends up writing for herself to sing now that she's presumably calling most of the shots with regard to vocal melody now.

****"The Slumber" got stuck in my head a lot during a recent grueling backpacking trip