AIT!
Romanticismo Oltranzista

I read about AIT! as one of the most important neo-cabaret projects in the world of dark music, and things like that. Romanticismo Oltranzista was originally released in 2007, and you can still (when I write this) order the CD from the band’s bandcamp. Now it comes in a vinyl version with new cover etc. this can be ordered from the labels site, in case you want it. I read that the band sold out several of their albums quickly and things like that, I can’t say if that is impressive or not as they don’t say how large the editions were – they could have been one for all I know. And Internet doesn’t give much there because searching for this record doesn’t even yield a reliable account for band members, so I wonder how much of an impact the album did do.

Musically it is rather interesting though, it takes inspiration from the cabaret style, kind of old-school stage entertainment in one aspect. But also disco and neo-folk, more modern touches in a rather dark rock framework. The lyrics are in Italian, another nice and fresh addition to this album. AIT! obviously dare to think outside established boxes and do their own thing, something like that is always interesting. The album is also fairly varied, but the tempo is low through the entire things, something that makes it seem less dynamic. The playing time is quite sensible though with about 44 minutes, it is always positive when the bands don’t overstay their welcome.

There are many interesting things about AIT! but the songs are so slow and everything just melts into something distant background noise. It is not an album that makes you take notice, and not one you want to just sit down and listen to. It doesn’t really work as background if you are driving or working with anything either as you want something faster for that. So, I find this album to be quite hopeless in that regard, but with the positive addition that it is a band that dares to think outside the box, that wants to do something personal rather than just become one of the incalculable bands that just follow others and do what countless others have done before them – that is commendable.

So, it is a band that tries, they have the courage. You need to have the courage to fail in order to succeed, and these guys unfortunately fail quite badly and I would say that it is a very tiresome album to listen to. It has its fresh ideas, but everything drowns in this slow and extremely boring soundscape that makes out the entire album.

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