The Zonnhaider's Club – The Forthcoming Spring
Release: 22.06.2007Format: CD
Genre: Pop / Rock / Indie /
Psychedelic / Elektronika
01 heaven is now
02 the forthcoming spring
03 let the faith be faith
04 london
05 where we once had begun
06 so weak wolf larson
07 treatment of the past
08 the sea and the bay
09 tonight
10 jaded travellers
11 the falls of old ealen
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BuyPress
"One of the surprises of 2007. The Forthcoming Spring of The Zonnhaider´s Club is like a dreary trip in the night train from Cologne to Berlin, like an endless unsecured jump from the sky, a departure of dusty trains of thought. [...] The debut of The Zonnhaider’s Club reaches immensely for his victims, carefully, but unerringly."
Alternative Nation – 8/10 points
„Here comes very difficult material!“
Klangschau – 8/10 points
"The Forthcoming Spring spins tales of the standstill of time. This music retells the world again.[...] Slow motion studies of the world. A loud whisper."
Plattentests – 7/10 points
Review
Eleven songs full of pure magic.
Eleven songs full of imagination.
Eleven songs full of space, full of life, full of light, full of darkness, full
of harmony, full of dissonance, full of love.
In short: A 47-minute trip through foggy memories, invisible figures and reflections
between hope and grief.
Certainly that requires some introducing explanations...
The item "Zonnhaider" is a being from a higher history of which this
chapter "The Forthcoming Spring" is part of. To put it in a few words,
the "Zonnhaider" is a mirror of the protagonists, which makes up different
stories, dreams, emotions and realities and embraces them. It collects, develops
and expresses. A spirit which mediates between oblivion and presence, dreams
and their counter dreams, love and hatred and which carries real-to-be desired
child stories in itself and unites them with all the adult cruelty. Somebody,
who searches, as we all do, his way through the muddled thicket and strolls invisibly
between us. Through this figure The Zonnhaider's Club (Martin Ketelhut and Christopher
Schön) tries to narrate, to sing and to move.
You can call it pop, indie or elektronika. It doesn’t matter at all.
Musically the songs walk in slow motion through those many places of "The
Forthcoming Spring". In the wide tension curves the dreamy and warm sounds
are wrecked only seldom by eruptions and if, then those soon collapse and vanish.
An army crowd of instruments braid themselves, delightful and melancholic tunes
come out, disappear again - and two voices are confronted: One bright and clear,
the other urgently deep. They escort the listener through the fog.
The chapter "The Forthcoming Spring" broaches the issue of a floating
condition between the Here and Now and a time or a place which one longs for
in vain. Already after the first sounds and the first words of the opener "Heaven
is now" the listener becomes aware that "The Forthcoming Spring" is
not necessarily a happy perspective and carries less hope than the title might
suppose. "All of your life you've been frightened of yourself."
The Spring turns out to be a desperate wish... a place which is long way off
and might not even exist at all. Still there are words comforting all this yet
persistent murky perception: "If you come home you should know,
that you are welcome all the time." With “Heaven is Now" The
Zonnhaider's Club refers to the Here and Now, not only as a bitter down-to-earth
reality, but as consolation and chance. In the other songs own memories and also
external stories join together, for example in "London" which is
recited like a plaintive compassionate Mantra. A true story of an old English
woman who speaks about her own tragedy - in exactly that state which "The
Forthcoming Spring" symbolises:
A floating between inebriate longing and the shattered awakening in the midst
of a sombre reality. Here The Zonnhaider's Club is more an invisible and passive
listener who merely puts painful questions: "Why did you treat yourself
so hard?"
Over and over again one wish returns in the songs: The wish to be child again,
to restore the carefree nature of the past days. This wish is often condemned
to fail and thus only the escape in imagination and inebriation remains for most
of the people in "The Forthcoming Spring". The childish attempt to
make so distant stories come true is the basic approach of The Zonnhaider's club,
also in the last song "The Falls of Old Ealen" in which Martin Ketelhut,
who writes all lyrics and music, finds himself in this state of floatation: "I
want to be child again, I want all the tales I know to be true." And nevertheless
also mischievous moments get lost in the darkness with a confident smile on the
lips. So for example in the prancing "Let the faith be faith". Besides
all painful perceptions this work is a big homage to friendship, to imagination
and... well... to love. It leads to sombre places, however, with a sheet anchor
and a flashlight.
"The Forthcoming Spring" is not a real debut. Many stories from the "Wintergold"
(the enclosing history) are existing, already set to music, but for the first time
Martin Ketelhut and his new singer Christopher Schön (who impresses, above
all, in the title song and contributes a trumpet to some songs) get their world
to bundle up and interweave it to a homogeneous story.
If you immerse yourself in the story and leave the music in your heart, it will
remain inside and you want to lose yourself in it over and over again. This might
be a promise.