Cathedral - The Guessing Game

The cover art looks awesome, and the album has leaked. Gonna listen to it soon!

I think you doomsters are getting yet another great album of the genre.

Wonderful album, best from 2010 (for me) so far, probably one of the greatest of the year...

Specting a staff review soon

A FANTASTIC ALBUM.

A pure Cathedral's

Listened to it a lot of times now and it is by far Cathedral's weakest. A 6 at most.

It's makes sense as Cathedral would (Wacky but cool). I Agree with the riff's comment above but I would say it sounds a bit cleaner than a few of their last albums. Same kinda clean (for everything but the bass) that Ethereal Mirror and Carnival Bizarre had going with the same sort of writing imagination. I also hear a bit of the feel of Caravan beyond redemption in here too.

Still reigning as my favourite album of the year. It makes me not care about the rest of Cathedral's back catalogue. There may be a couple of duds but the strong tracks cover over them pretty much.

Gorgeous.

THE BEST IN 2010....THAT SIMPLE...

So many influeces..even in the lyrics. And the cover is simply amazing. I really apreciated the prog-orientet passages; but less the doom flavour to it; like those two influeces could have resulted in something even better...

The good songs on this album are very good but I feel it's quite inconsistent overall. When the prog influences work out, the result is absolutely beautiful, but they do get a bit clunky at times and at those times detract from the quality.

Overall it's a good album though, even if a bit uneven.

This is definitely my album of the year. There is a couple of weak-ish songs, but the rest of the album is so immense it's like that doesn't even matter. "Cats, Incense, Candles & Wine" is so quirky, and such a wonderful song. I also get the feeling Lee is a fellow cat lover from the lyrics. lol xD

On the flipside, "Requiem For The Voiceless" shows they are still highly adept in creating slow, mournful, monstrous and menacing doom. The lyrics about animal cruelty just gives the song an even more unsettling edge. Definitely one of, if not the highlight of the album.

There's so much creativity and imagination on this album that it's just staggering. But its still great to see them just do a heads-down rocking, stoner-doom stomper like "The Casket Chasers" as well!

Just a stunning album.

Musicianship: 8
Vocal: 7
Atmosphere: 8
Melody: 6
Originality: 7
Production: 8
CD Covers: 9

Best Songs:
Disc I
04. Death Of An Anarchist
07. Cats, Incense, Candles & Wine
Disc II
04. The Running Man

Interesting Comments:
Angelic Storm

This album is rather bizarre, but in a good way. It's obvious on songs such as 'Funeral of dreams' and 'Cats, incense, candles and wine' that the weird, 70s Prog Rock influences are used to full effect, but the band still sound very doomy and heavy when considering 'Casket chasers' and 'Death of an anarchist'. In my eyes Cathedral have always been a bit experimental with their sound, but on this album they really take it to a new level. 'Painting in the dark' seems a bit too long for its own good and 'Ghost galleon' is a bit boring towards the end, but this is simply another example of Cathedral's long-standing musical talent.

I remember I listened to this album in its release and after that searched em a while. I consider this effort as their best but it is a very difficult music for no-listerers of the genre.

Forgot how good this actually is. Was the first warm (ish) day I've felt in a while, and happened to be out with a nice ale in my hand when this came on. Poifect. Shame the follow up album was such a mediocre retreading of older styles.

I agree with !J.O.O.E.! ^ and I must say, this has got to be one of the most underrated records ever. Don't really get why Marcel said it's their weakest and a 6 at most, but he probably just missed the old Cathedral sound.

Soooo fucking underrated (still!)