Chimes At Midnight. Madrugada

The return of a giant band, with a sound so welcome. Fans know why the band became silent after its farewell tour following 'Madrugada'. A reunion tour celebrating 20 years 'Industrial Silence' wetted the surviving members' appetite and in the beginning of 2022 I am treated to one of the greatest musical gifts possible: a new Madrugada album. An album containing the full majesty of the band. Seldom has there been a song more deserving to be called 'Majesty' as the single of the 'Grit' album. Enter 'Help Yourself To Me', the third song on Chimes At Midnight. Man, it brings tears to one's eyes. Majesty, indeed.

Madrugada was the ideal mix of that voice, enormously inventive guitar playing and that overall atmosphere. Between the three a giant sound was built. No matter how delicate the song, the sound was always huge. Between the four of them the musicians had caught beauty in their net after casting it into some Norwegian fjord and never let go of it. Beauty was always an integral piece of their musicianship, the bond binding the band. This led to monumental songs spread over all five the band's album releases between 1999 and 2008. I caught on somewhere in 2000, I think, and saw the band live for the first time in 2001 or 2002 after the release of 'The Nightly Disease'. The last time was during the farewell tour 2009 or 2010. The idea that a new show is now a possibility is so exciting.

With Chimes At Midnight Madrugada does everything right it seems. It is a partly different band. There is a lesser role for the guitar. The huge sound is there though and that voice of course. I do not know another singer with an impressive voice like Sivert Høyem has. It starts right at the very beginning of the album with 'Nobody Loves You Like I Do'. That majesty is all over the album. It speaks to me in volumes. Of course there are guitars. What I mean with my comment is that Madrugada shows that it is a trio now. The guitar is complementary and not a driving force like it was often in the days of old.

This also means that some of the fire has gone out of Madrugada. It was Robert Burås who stoked it mainly with his slide playing. On the other side, we are all fifteen years older and so much older than we were then. In that sense Chimes At Midnight is more a solo album by singer Sivert Høyem. In hindsight his last EP, 'Roses Of Neurosis', was, in part, an exercise for the new Madrugada. Except, this is even bigger in sound. Madrugada has a fullness of sound that is nearly incomparable to anything else in the world, including Høyem solo. And it is all here.

The more I listen to Chimes At Midnight the more I'm impressed by it. Slowly but surely I'm swept of my feet. The band mainly presents me with mid-tempo ballads. With the average U.S. band I'm gone in about 30 seconds, bored out of my skull. With Madrugada I'm just sucked deeper into the album, by the song. As I wrote, that trio is majesty and magical. Even when a song starts out so-so, like 'Call My Name', it explodes later on and everything is alright.

Reunions of favourite bands are not always a pleasure. Madrugada's is. It is everything I would want from the band and that includes a host of new songs that settle easily among my favourites of old. Because of the unexpected gift I was given, it can almost compete with the surprise 'Industrial Silence' was at the time. The only difference is the level of expectation and even that was side-lined as I was not expecting anything.

Chimes At Midnight is fabulous. An album to play loud and totally emerge under, to enjoy with every fibre in my body. "Through the darkness and the pleasure, I love you beyond measure", sings Sivert Høyem in 'Help Yourself To Me'. Something like that indeed is how I'm enjoying this album.

Wout de Natris