You may be wondering, 'Is the band Молчат Дома, who created the album, Этажи, a foreign band?' and 'Are they going to be singing some non-english language, perhaps Russian?' The answer to both of these questions is yes. I can't remember how I found this album originally, but one day it came up in my YouTube recommended, I instantly recognized the cover, and decided to give it a listen. It was really good.
It reminded of me listening to Joy Division - Unknown Pleasures for the first time.
Note: In this review, I italicize Russian words written in the
Roman alphabet, put "quotation marks" around English translations, and
do nothing to Russian words written in the Cyrillic alphabet.
Молчат Дома or Molchat Doma (roughly translates to "The Houses are Silent") is a 'cold wave' band. This is a genre of music that I don't know too much about, but from what I understand the genre is close to goth, except more detached and minimalistic. Similar to goth, cold wave is very depressive and often leans heavily into synth and new wave influences. Although cold wave had its beginnings in the 70s, it recently had a bit of a revival, which Molchat Doma (formed in 2017) is part of.
Molchat Doma's music is characterized by dreary, but surprisingly catchy and danceable synth melodies and echoy, detached singing. Their musical style is very reminiscent of bands such as Joy Division and The Cure. Although I can't understand Russian, the band's lyrics are also really good if you translate them. They are also extremely depressive and paint a bleak picture of life in Russia.
The album, Этажи, Etazhi, or "Floors", is Molchat Doma's second studio album, and their breakout album in the US. The popularity of this album in the US can be partially attributed to the use of the song Судно (Борис Рыжий), Sudno (Boris Ryzhy), or "Vessel (Boris Ryzhy)" in TikTok memes.
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| Molchat Doma in front of Hotel Panorama |
The album starts out with a deceptively upbeat sounding song called На дне, Na dne, or "At the Bottom". The disco esque beat and melodic synths in the beginning of this song might trick you into thinking this is a fun, although a bit dreary, synth wave song, ready to be danced to. However, once you understand the lyrics, the dark undertones of the music become much more clear. The lyrics describe a kind of depressed apathy, a person who spends their days smoking cigars and drinking vodka, waiting for their life to end, hence the name "At the Bottom". This song also does a really good job of setting the tone of the album; don't expect things to get happier from here.
Continuing with the depressive themes, the song Фильмы, Filmy, or "Films" describes someone who disassociates so much that their life feels like a movie. The person understands that everything happening is real, but they feel like an actor rather than a real person living their life. In case you don't know, disassociation is a symptom of severe depression. This song is particularly reminiscent of Joy Division, with a bleak, minimalistic melody and sullen spoken vocals.
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| Molchat Doma performing in Saint Petersburg, Russia, 2020 |
My two favorite songs on this album are Волны, Volny, or "Waves" and Прогноз, Prognoz, or "Forecast". Vlony is probably the most upbeat song on this album lyrically; it is a love song, and talks about how finding love helped the narrator find happiness and spirituality, however this happiness also comes with the notion that it can all be taken away in an instant. Musically, this song is supper catchy, with an awesome beat and plenty of new wave sound effects. I'm not really sure what the lyrics of Prognoz mean (maybe some kind of metaphor about war?) but that song is probably the most upbeat song musically on the album. It has the kind of energetic synth melody you'd expect from a Fartbarf song.
I don't think I could finish this review without talking about the TikTok song, Судно (Борис Рыжий), Sudno (Boris Ryzhy), or "Vessel (Boris Ryzhy)". I've never used TikTok, but I looked up some of the memes for this review, and to be honest, I'm not that impressed. You can watch a compilation here, but the only ones that I liked were the first one, the 'what living in Russia is really like' one at 0:58, and the 'Russians vs Americans' one at 1:19. The rest were pretty bad. Anyway, it's not that surprising that this song became popular on a platform where people dance to songs because this is a very danceable song, and easily one of the best songs on the album. It has this great driving beat and a repetitive melody that gets more and more intense as the song goes on. The lyrics of the song are based off of the poems of Russian poet, Boris Ryzhy. Boris's poems focused on the subject of post-Soviet delinquency and despair. Boris himself suffered from extreme depression, as well as drug and alcohol addictions. He committed suicide at 26 years old on May 7, 2001. Just like Boris's poems, the song's lyrics describe the hardships of living in post-Soviet Russia, grimly stating that it's more pleasant to die than to live.
Молчат Дома - Этажи aka Molchat Doma - Etazhi is a refreshing album in the goth/new wave genre, and a great listen, even if you don't speek the language. However, if you take the time to translate and understand the lyrics, it becomes a dark, harrowing experience.
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