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In essence, Midwinter Tears is a reissue of a compilation that reissued earlier Tristania material. Originally called "Midwintertears/Angina", this compilation collected the bands demo, Tristania, which, for some reason, was retitled to Midwintertears, as well as their Angina CD single and was issued back in April of 2001. However, four years later, following the band's release of Ashes under SPV Records, Napalm Records retitled this compilation Midwinter Tears and included new artwork and a bonus DVD that features a DVD reissue of the band's first live VHS recording, Widows Tour. Obviously, this release was meant to cash in on a former band under their label, but either way, it's a nice collector's piece to have for fans of the band, even if you already own it. Sure, fans of Tristania from the start were greatly urked by the reissue of this, as compilations rarely ever get reissued for any reason, a new one typically just comes along a few years later. However, there is justification to purchase this edition of the release, and that would be the inclusion of the bonus DVD, which will be looked at shortly. However, let's examine the audio first. The first disc here, as stated, combines both their demo and Angina single, and, luckily, are nicely seperated from each other instead of randomly being mixed into one track list. The first four tracks come off the bands Tristania demo, and what a demo it is. The production quality here is simply fantastic for a demo recording, and the music itself is simply dark and beautiful. "Sirene" lives up to it's name by being a rather dismal, but desolate sounding instrumental that sets the tone perfectly for the tracks to follow. "Midwintertears", however, takes a little time to get into, as it does start off a bit rocky given the introduction that is brought onto the listeners, sounding a little bland and not quite as atmospheric as it could be, but oncce the song does start going, you'll be pulled into Tristania's cold, dark world. While the songs on here are rather long, the music never gets boring, even going at such a slow pace as these song do, and they only continue to impress as it goes along, both within the track like with "Midwintertears" where the song just progressively sounds colder and even more evil, as well as by each track. The second part of this compilation is the band's Angina demo, which is a far cry from the music on their demo. Right off the bat, the title track "Angina" kicks in loudly, clearly showing there was no real mastering or anything of the tracks to handle the volume level, just thrown onto the disc as is. The title track of the single is actually the "Short Version", basically a radio edit, so you don't quite get the full impact of the actual song, but it's still a hard hitting track that shows off the talent that the band has, both musically in creating beautiful yet dark music, and vocally through harsh vocals and beautiful female singing that you would expect on a release that follows a more operatic style then a Gothic Metal presentation. Sadly, this is also the case with "Opus Relinque (Radio Edit)", which was obvious by the name, but there is no mention in the track list that "Angina" was edited from the original to be more radio friendly in length. "Saturnine", however, closes the single, and this compilation out, on an awkward note, utilizing a more electronic approach to the sound to mix in with the keyboards and drums to create a song that does sound haunting, but winds up being offset by that said electronica. Honestly, it's just not a good closing track and ultimately just comes off as something tacked onto the single itself to encourage more people to buy it. Lastly comes the bonus DVD, Widow's Tour, which is not mentioned at all anywhere on the case or visible artwork, just on the last page of the inside booklet. Other then that, all you know is its a bonus DVD with live footage. Yes, it's a DVD transfer, but surely fans who own this release would like to know they're just buying a transfered edition of the VHS tape. Once the DVD loads, you get the Napalm Record title animation which seems to take forever, which fades into the title of the DVD "Tristania Live", which, again, seems to take forever. Neither of these screens can be skipped by the way. This brings you to a list of all the songs on this release, and the option to play all, and for those watching on your PC, you can only click the tiny box next to the title, and not the actual title of the song like common logic would dictate. The production quality on the actual concert itself is rather nice, though you can tell it's from a VHS tape as the snow commonly associated with them is there, and the audio is still a bit muffled, though not enough to hinder the enjoyment from the concert. The hindering of enjoyment comes from the band's then female vocalist who comes out and, during every song, stands there moving her arms around, up and down, making a sort of wave-like motion with them like some kind of lame belly dancer or something. Either that or just standing there in her cloak, staring forward before singing. Though her stage presence completely offsets the somewhat energetic performance being put on by the rest of the band, her voice is still beautiful and really just takes center stage whenever she chimes in. The video is also cut between songs with scenes that state the song name, which is rather pointless honestly and leaves a gap of dead air every time a song ends. So, for the first four clips on the DVD, you get a somewhat energetic performance by the band that is hindered by the rather boring physical performance of their female singer, though she does a great job when she actually sings. If she didn't do such a good job, her dancing would definitely pose a great hindering on the overall performance of the concert and drag it down greatly due to how out of place it is compared to everyone else on the stage. But there's still two videos left. "Evenfall (Video)" comes off like it's meant to be a music video, and in manay cases it is, but all it does is recycle footage used during the four tracks that make up the Widow's Tour video you just watched, as well as unused footage that didn't make the video of the actual song, which seems pointless. Why not include the actual live video on there instead of throwing scenes of that live footage mixed together with random scenes of certain band members acting something out in Romanticism-era clothing with swords about a man who kills a girl with said sword then laments the decision. It all just comes off as a waste in the end and should have just used the original footage in the first place. The same thing happens with "Wasteland's Caress (Tour Cut)", except that footage with people in Romantic clothing is replaced with black and white footage of the band back stage and before the show mixed in with the actual footage of the song. Again, this is pointless and should have just been left alone, but it does distract the viewer from the insanely poor stage presence of their female vocalist, who just stands there most of the time staring blankly at the ceiling. Overall, if you already have the original version Midwinters Tears/Angina, there's really no reason to add Midwinter Tears to your collection unless your a die hard fan who has to have all the material under the band's name, or you just want the additional DVD that comes along with the release. Ultimately, it seems silly to reissue this compilation, especially only four years later. One would imagine the label would have just done a proper reissue of the DVD, cleaning it up, adding more footage or the rest of the concert if available as a VHS probably could not hold the entire performance, but the last two prove there was more to that show that could have been added in the first place. In the end, it's a nice collectable piece, but if you own one or the other, there's really no need to go buy it again. |
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