L.E.A.K: The Old Teahouse

Released by: Cold Meat Industry - CMI 97

Release date: 2001-09-11

Format: CD

Tracklist:  

1: Untitled 01 07:46 min
2: Untitled 02 07:14 min
3: Untitled 03 04:53 min
4: Untitled 04 05:18 min
5: Untitled 05 06:18 min
6: Untitled 06 04:50 min
7: Untitled 07 05:18 min
8: Untitled 08 05:45 min
9: Untitled 09 08:28 min

Total playingtime: 55.50 min

General Facts:

L.E.A.K is basically Heid minus one member. The Old Teahouse is L.E.A.K's debut album and it was released last year by Cold Meat Industry. The first 2000 copies came in a 6 paged digipack.

Review: 

What we have here is an album, mainly consisting of instrumental Dark Ambient Industrial and noise. The music reminds me a bit of raison d'être and Sephiroth, but what separates L.E.A.K from these bands is that L.E.A.K is far more surprising. Sure, the above mentioned bands also have a couple songs where the nature of the tracks suddenly changes, but I think this element is far more generally represented within the music of L.E.A.K, which makes it much more unpredictable. At times, The Old Teahouse is sometimes a marriage between heaven and hell when it comes to sound textures. The tracks may start in an ordinary relaxed Dark Ambient tradition to suddenly evolve into a brand of ringing noises, samples and distortion. In fact, this unity between harsh and solemn noise can be found in the very first seconds on this album and it's evident in nearly all the tracks, yet in different ways.

The addition of more sublime tunes is also a cool aspect and it seems that there are quite a number of details to be discovered by continuous listening to L.E.A.K's music. It's also interesting to see that L.E.A.K has dared to experiment with sitar and cello on some tracks.

I didn't like this album that much the first time I heard it but I became more fond after hearing it again after a week or so. I then became aware that many of the tunes had been infused into me without my knowledge, which is a positive sign I guess. Even though this album has some passages where I just feel like skipping the track, overall it is a respectable debut by a band which seems to have many interesting ideas. If you're tired of the ordinary predictable albums, then this might just be something for you.

Ectonaut