Katanga – Moonchild

Releasedate: 28-01-2011; Label: Massacre Records
By: Lara Cappelli

Katanga is a German based Gothic band. “Moonchild” is their latest release.

Katanga comes up as a rather Gothic band, with the typical spooky atmosphere that is the backdrop of deep male vocals and sporadic female ones. As the listening goes by, these typical elements sound way too familiar though and are even emphasized by the production that seems to frame the whole album into the same sound where an effective change is absent, especially in the guitar parts. Although variation is present within the songs, the more one shrinks away from the single tracks and looks the album as a whole, the more everything seems to sound incredibly alike from what has just been listened. At some point it seems that “Moonchild” lacks of that component that could make the album really worth listening. This lack is easily noticeable when such an album is composed by 18 songs, that evidently need some kind of variation to avoid any repetition and all that this might cause. Unfortunately, this variation comes apparently too late as it’s present only in the last three songs of the album, which are re-arrangements of older ones. It seems like Katanga, when going through their own works, are able to find their faults and eventually adjust them. That makes hope for their future works to be shaped around that new and revised sound of them.

Links:
Katanga MySpace