Qntal – IV: Ozymandias

Medieval electro, with a pinch of renaissance. That;s how you could describe the music of the German formation Qntal with a little fantasy. “Qntal IV – Ozymandias” is (as the title indicates) the fourth album of singer Syrah (Sigrid Hausen), multi-instrumentalist Michael Popp and sound magician / producer Philipp Groth.

Qntal finds inspiration in divergent medieval songs and poems (in English, Latin and ancient German) and gives these a medieval twist by using samplers, synths ands drum computers. Their previous album (‘Qntal III’) was a little smooth and almost ‘Celtic Myst-like’ in my opinion. I suspect this was mainly caused by the departure of Ernst Horn, who wanted to focus completely on Deine Lakaien and also gets in the spotlights with his project Helium Vola.

What strikes me about “Qntal IV” is the variation: not only do various languages appear in the songs (with a rather promiment German accent of Syrah in the English opening track ‘All for One’), the thirteen tracks offer something for everyone. Atmospheric Dead Can Dance-like songs (like the wondrously beautiful wonderschone ‘Remember me’), cheerful medieval tunes (‘Cupido’) and uptempo floorfillers (like ‘Flamma’, taken from the Carmina Burana). Still I miss a sharp edge, but nevertheless you can very pleasantly dream away with ‘Qntal IV’. By the way, Qntal is one of the headliners at the Summer Darkness festival, in the middle of August in Utrecht.

mp3 samples:
track 04: Blac
track 06: Cupido
track 08: Flamma

artist: Qntal
label: E-Wave Records
details: 15 tracks (lim. digipack edition), 2005 [EWAVE 038]