Finland, 1997, avant-prog
Höyry-kone – Huono parturi: I wish I could learn roll an R the way a Finnish tongue can. I love the way the album starts, with plainsong-like vocals with minimal instrumentation that only builds and fleshes itself out as the first track progresses, pulling back at the moment of climax and not giving the expected payoff, a refreshing change. Very much a liturgical feeling to the album opening. You glorious bastards! You scared the shit out of me on the second track, like an electric shock after the soothing, lonely vocals of the first. This is more what I expected from an avant-prog band, angular ascending and descending violins. And so it proceeds thus, complete with the quasi-operatic vocals of zeuhl.
