The third re-mastered album to be released by Silber, Cold saw the Arizona based group (made up of Mike Vanportfleet, Tara Vanflower and David Galas) move from their arid and humid abode to the snowy and chilly state of Ohio, thus creating an album that discovered new landscapes and surroundings via its mix of darkwave and ambience respectively. Cold isn’t just the name of an album here, it’s a statement of the feelings the album produces.
‘Frozen’ for example, the first track on the album, emits a shimmering flourish of wintry darkwave guitars and ethereal vocals, that with pace and emotion, set the scene for the music to come and lure you tenderly into continuing your journey into the album. ‘Frozen’ flows effortlessly into ‘Bare’ with a slow yet apparent drum beat precluding the first appearance of Vanflower’s haunting voice that duets perfectly with Vanportfleet’s and adds a palpable dimension of emotion and distinction to the track.
‘Baltica’ meanwhile adds a classically gothic element with nursery rhyme style rhythm to the music as well as an opener that encompasses Vanflower “la-la-ing” to add to the surreal and dreamlike quality of the track, making way for her whispered vocals to take centre stage in one of the stand out songs on the album.
‘Colder’, an instrumental movement, also ranks highly within the pedigree of tracks that accumulates this album, with a minimalist and isolating, almost drone like beginning, until the darkwave, slowed down a notch or two, kicks in, creating an affecting and sombre picture that blankets the whole album in terms of imagery and theme.
On its release, Alternative Press ranked Cold one of the most important goth albums of all time, and with this re-mastering you can easily tell, or more appropriately hear why they were right. However rather than the album merely speaking volumes of itself it goes on to give evidence of just how important, creative and influential lycia were, and while their fan base may have shrunk after their split, their sway over goth, darkwave and ambient is truly eternal.
