Night Is The New Day

[Brensly]

Amazing album. The Longest Year, Liberation and Promise of Deceit stand out for me. Love them. All songs on the album are great though

 

[Phoenix5]

onward into battle and departer for me.

 

[Katatonic89]

I just noticed that Nyström "only" wrote 1 song and co-wrote 3 of the songs the rest of the music is done by Renkse.

Only Nyström: Idle Blood (also Nyströms lyrics).
Nyström/Renkse: Forsaker, Onward Into Battle and Ashen
Renkse: The rest.

 

[Lyre's Harmony]

1st listen: dissapiontment. I love katatonia rawness and this is incredibly dreamy, but after a few more listens it is definitly a worthy entry into the Katatonia discography. its amazing! dark, extremly complex, ive never heard so many layered melodies, its like a new excperience every time i hear it! but it is definitly a grower, like all Katatonia. my fav is NEW NIGHT which has the piano melody from the miniwebsite teaser and is absolutly incredible, dissolving bonds come to mind. and to me, besides the keyboard sounds, Idle Blood sounds ABSOLUTLY NOTHING LIKE WATERSHED, jonas' vocals a so much darker and panic-y than Ak's

 

[Vincent J.]

So whats this about the atmosphere being different? is it not so bleak as usual or ?

Hmm, it's more diverse if you ask me.
From the almost romantically nostalgic Idle Blood, to the heartwrenching Nephilim, to the desperate Day and then the Shade, to the storytelling sad Departer.
But I can certainly hear hope in there.
Don't fear, it's still Katatonia. But just listen for yourself

 

[Ejay]

This is a really good album - to be honest it's taken me some listens but I'm getting to adore it...it's not a very easy album to digest at first, lot's of layers, synths, electronics, etc... it's very dark though, in a comforting way and I like it. It's also very adventerous in a subtle way. There are a couple things I would change in a few songs but The longest Year, The Promise of Deceit, Day... and Departer are pretty much perfect however The Day and The Shade just kind of ends, which is annoying cause it's a great song

Overall, it's a magnificent album... i'll probably enjoy this more than TGCD

This.

At first bland, almost... boring. But this is a real grower.

 

[nizzon]

I think its a strange album. TGCD feels really really simple compared to this, not a bad thing.
I like it, and I think it will be great with some time.
But right now I miss some more heavy parts and since the songs shift so much and have strange structures and no real choruses I would have preffered if some of them were longer, right now it gets kinda messy. But I i guess it will set with time.


As for Linders part, i love it.

it almost feels like jonas's uh lets say "character" dies and then linder comes in as the brother in this kind of mournful way. its just perfect really.

...this.

 

[Amy-Selic]

Not trying to bash the album because in all fairness it's really very good and i'm enjoying it, but I don't see how a few of you find this to be a complex album. It just isn't, and each song really only consists of 2-3 parts with a simple short instrumental synth laden bridge thrown in. katatonia have never been know for "complexity" and that could be why I like them so much, but something in these songs just feels cut off, as if they never got enough time to truly take off. Don't get me wrong, I DONT WANT a prog album from them with 15 parts per song, but I just found it funny that a few of you seem to think it's complex in any way. The only complexity i can understand is the depth of the keyboards synths and soundscapes, but structure wise, it's just a step above DO and maybe an inch above TGCD. It's an album heavily influenced by trip hop, which seems to be the direction jonas likes(he wrote most of this album and didn't he write unfurl?), and I think what I appreciate most is just how different it is from past albums atmosphere wise.

Oh and nephilim has one of the more obnoxious choruses I've heard in awhile. Shame because the verses are so good.

 

[nizzon]

Depends on what you compare it with.
Its nothing revolutionary, but i feel its just a bit more of everything (the riffs are a bit stranger, bigger and more shifts between soft/heavy, weirder vocallines, more layers, more play with different sounds, more technobeats, stranger transitions, a guest vocalist and then the cuts that you pointed out yourself) and it doesnt have to be that much more when every track is 4-4,5mins long.

TGCD is defenitely more straight forward.


Edit: No one has mentioned the female "backing vocals" (lalala) in Nephilim either. Who is that? Axe's bird?

 

[ghostsun]

It's clearly Jonas singing there haha.
Great new album. Forsaker, The Longest Year, Liberation and Promise of Deceit are my favourites. New Night is also good. but I don't really like Krister Linder in the Departer ..

 

[FUBAR]

Hmm, it's more diverse if you ask me.
From the almost romantically nostalgic Idle Blood, to the heartwrenching Nephilim, to the desperate Day and then the Shade, to the storytelling sad Departer.
But I can certainly hear hope in there.
Don't fear, it's still Katatonia. But just listen for yourself

Cool thanks, looking forward to hearing this diversity.

 

[Brensly]

It's clearly Jonas singing there haha.

It's clearly Jonas singing with female backing vocals if you ask me

 

[isolation_years]

ah im surprised at how much i LOVE krister linders vocals in departer, i didnt like his last album much, but i havent heard it in a while

 

[Brave.Archangel]

i don't like the album, don't know exactly why

it seems like one long song

the atmosphere is there but the songs aren't

esp. didn't like the opeth influence, cause i want to katatonia be kata and opeth be opeth - each of them has their own good and bad sides, and when it's interefered, it's not good imo

i liked only the opening track and the last one, with the guest vox...

Man I hear almost NO Opeth in this album except maybe in one guitar solo

 

[i aint play this]

The level of detail in NITND is stunning. Putting every little sound in its place is what the band did on it, the Trip-hop-ish beats are very well done...and in the right times. There is a particular waving synth sound in Day & then the Shade that is so subtle and eerie it's amazing. I also noticed a calm, peaceful feeling in almost every song that never gets lost throughout the album, I guess ''heavy lullabies'' are two good words to describe the songs (partly due to the brilliant keyboard/mellotron work).

Katatonia have always worked with the quiet/loud dynamics, but this time some really angry, wicked riffs seem more ''unexpected'' than before because the whole thing just feels really spontaneous and i'm yet to detect a forced moment here. Inheritance made me crap my pants for being such a ''pure feeling'' gorgeous song.

The Promise of Deceit is probably my least favorite track, but I still like it a lot. Only winners in this album.

 

[Brave.Archangel]

+1

 

[Bound2Fate]

Man I hear almost NO Opeth in this album except maybe in one guitar solo

I haven't heard the album yet...still waiting for it to arrive...but just based on the teaser on I think Idle Blood, Jonas sounds just like Mikael when he says "You...there"..."something...something?"...not sure on the lyrics lol.

Anybody get their pre-ordered copy in the US yet?

 

[Brave.Archangel]

I haven't heard the album yet...still waiting for it to arrive...but just based on the teaser on I think Idle Blood, Jonas sounds just like Mikael when he says "You...there"..."something...something?"...not sure on the lyrics lol.

Anybody get their pre-ordered copy in the US yet?

Aside from the fact that Opeth and Katatonia create some of the most beautiful music out there, I see very little similarities between the two.

I'd agree with the folks who say Idol Blood has some Opeth vibe to it, but honestly I think that's only because the finger picking acoustic guitar and harmonized vocals.

But even if people think it sounds a bit like Opeth, isn't that better than sounding like anything else? LOL

I say if you're gonna sound like a band, Opeth is a fucking good option.

 

[rrjii2000]

Well after listening to the album through a few times, I'd describe it as: it's dark, it gives the feeling of despair and at times it's almost eerie... like it's strange, different, yet intriguing.

Yes it is creepy, "Inheritance" reminds me of the opening parts of the game "Resident Evil 4", it seems muted, and isolated but overwhelming at the same time. This album just has an emotional attachment thats hard to put into words.

 

[season1234]

I have listened to the album (including Ashen) all the way through several times now, and I can understand all of the opinions on display here.

I can totally understand concern over "where are the catchy choruses" or "it sounds like one long song". I myself was a little dissapointed that there are not any of Anders classic leads on this album, at least there were a few on TGCD, and I thought the choruses were generally much different, nothing extremely catchy like Deliberation, My Twin, July, In The White, etc. The album is also not as diverse as I expected, it is largely a slow, atmospheric turn (and I think 'Inside the City Of Glass' is a much better 'pure doom' song than Nephilim). I was surprised that Jonas wrote almost all of the music as well, not that it's really a problem, I am just so impressed with what Anders comes up with without fail and am not quite sure why he wrote so little for this album.

That being said.....

The album is so beautiful, so haunting, contains so many layers of depth with the abundance of keyboards & electronics, some of the vocal melodies are CLASSIC and remind me of a stream running gently on a winters night, that all of the complaints above seem minimal. There is a depth here that is quite astonishing, and although this record is def not as consistently heavy or up-tempo as the previous 2 records, I find myself more drawn into it on each listen, more impresssed by the difference between this one and the last LP.

As I said, my initial concerns/complaints are dissipating, and this is an album of extraordinary beauty and depth. If that is the trade off for less 'catchy' choruses, I am all for it. It is quite incredible to have seen this band progress and go through so many major mutations since I first began following them nearly 18 years ago.