If you’d told David Gahan and Martin Gore a year before the release of this latest album (which was still in the making at that time) that its title would be somewhat foreboding, the pair would likely have agreed, but for a rather different reason. Memento Mori roughly translates to ‘remember you’re going to die’—that’s what was on Gahan’s mind having just entered his sixties, whilst also remembering his stepfather, the man who raised and cared for him, who had died at just 61. But fate would prove both twisted and cruel when, without warning, it would take the life of Andy Fletcher on 26th May 2022. Depeche Mode’s third man was just 60 years old.However, this sudden death was not what primarily guided the somber, melancholic content of the record. Most of it was composed during the pandemic, which must have forced the band to ask themselves countless questions about their existence, their future and how these doubts would be manifested within their music (though Fletcher’s death would inevitably alter their approach to these same compositions). This all gives rise to a record which, whilst rejecting any semblance of ‘joie-de-vivre’, is a real return to more gothic, vintage and organic sounds. The album’s quasi-industrial opener, ‘My Cosmos is Mine’, sets the tone for the darker journey to come. The album takes a more stripped-back approach to the melodies, where Gahan’s sobering voice steers clear of all excess.In the midst of this darkness, the emphasis on synthesized sounds from a seemingly bygone era strikes a nostalgic chord without losing its edge (‘Wagging Tongue’, ‘Never Let Me Go’). These textures are accompanied by more saturated tones, taking us right back to their flirtations with rock in the 90s (‘My Favourite Stranger’). Memento Mori sounds like a kind of condensed version of the band’s more delicate songs without becoming a simple reconstruction of them. It has a subtle beauty which surely highlights the expertise of the musicians behind it, despite being somewhat overshadowed by the erratic nature of their discography over the last twenty years. Light filters through the cracks here and there on this album however, like the song ‘People are Good’, reminiscent of the classic ‘People are People’ released almost forty years ago. Remember that you’re meant to enjoy it… © Chief Brody/Qobuz

Genre-ingesting prog rock virtuosos Polyphia recorded their fourth album, Remember That You Will Die, with contributions from producers like Rodney Jerkins (Destiny's Child, Black Eyed Peas), Johan Lenox (Big Sean, Machine Gun Kelly), and Y2K (Doja Cat, Remi Wolf), although bandmembers Tim Henson and Scott LePage helmed its production. It marked the group's debuts on both the Rise Records label and the Billboard 200 chart, the latter thanks at least in part to the star power of such guests as Grammy winners Steve Vai and Brasstracks, Deftones' Chino Moreno, and charting rapper $not, among others from just as wide-ranging corners of the music world. Highlights include the playful "ABC," featuring R&B-pop singer Sophia Black, and "Chimera," a relatively brooding entry featuring raps by Lil West. The album closes on the Vai showcase "Ego Death," a multi-act instrumental sure to delight fans of Polyphia's scorching funk-rock.© Marcy Donelson /TiVo

Recorded in Gothenburg, Sweden, the Brighton, England-based metalcore unit's seventh studio long-player is as relentlessly heavy and doggedly melodramatic as 2014's well-received Lost Forever, Lost Together. It's also much, much better. Doubling down on the expansiveness of the latter release, All Our Gods Have Abandoned Us is both bedazzling and bewildering, an icy blast of politically charged apocalypse theater that pleases the eyes, but never ceases to box the listener's ears. That the band conduct such sonic malevolence from a platform built on veganism and environmental activism is both refreshing -- this is a genre that's often swimming in neediness, non-specific rage, and self-absorption -- and compelling. The reverb-heavy production work from Fredrik Nordström, which is likely informed by his time behind the board with melodic death metal giants like Dark Tranquillity, In Flames, and Opeth, contributes mightily to All Our Gods Have Abandoned Us' dark pageantry. Architects' signature blend of breakdown-heavy hardcore, symphonic screamo, and ambient post-metal has never sounded more muscular and refined. Fans who received an early taste of the LP via the towering single "A Match Made in Heaven" can rest assured that the remaining ten tracks follow suit, with highlights arriving via the punishing "Downfall," the pitiless and aptly-named opener "Nihilist," and the truly epic, eight-minute closer "Memento Mori," the latter of which suggests how Radiohead might have handled Kid A had they come from an extreme metal background instead of the baggy Brit-pop noughties. This is heady and hearty stuff delivered by a band surveying the ruins below from their creative peak.© James Christopher Monger /TiVo

Pagan or folk-metal, in which pummeling drums and roaring guitars match up with keening flutes and acoustic instruments from various folk cultures, has become one of the fastest-growing subgenres in metal, and Eluveitie created a sensation with their second full-length CD, 2008's Slania. This follow-up takes things to extremes, though, as the members of the Swiss eight-piece have put down their electric instruments and instead recorded an atmospheric, entirely folk-style record. Granted, they've done acoustic instrumental tracks on previous discs -- "Samon," "Anagantios," and "Giamonios" on Slania all plowed a similarly traditionalist groove -- but the focus on those sounds this time out offers Eluveitie the opportunity to expand their listener base beyond the metal audience. Their compositions continue to have the anthemic, cathartic power of metal, even without blastbeats or guitar solos, but there's an ominous feeling throughout Evocation I: The Arcane Dominion, particularly when Anna Murphy's hurdy-gurdy and new member Päde's flutes and whistles are droning and keening from the speakers. You'll be forgiven for looking down, expecting to see mist curling around your feet. Vocals in Gaulish, mostly by Murphy but sometimes by bandleader Chrigel Glanzmann, accentuate the Old World (really old -- the language predates Latin) vibe. The songs are all relatively short, and bracketed by intro and outro tracks as well as the short spoken piece "A Girl's Oath," so this journey into Europe's mystical past comes in under an hour, perfect for short modern attention spans. At the same time, it marks Eluveitie as one of the most interesting bands within their genre, and whets one's appetite for their return to full-blown metal. © Phil Freeman /TiVo

Felix Blumenfeld (1863-1931) was a virtuoso pianist, conductor and teacher whose class comprised the likes of Simon Barere, Maria Grinberg and Vladimir Horowitz. But he was also a composer of an oeuvre of breathtaking beauty, originality and sophistication. Blumenfeld was born in the Ukraine, into a family of Austrian-Jewish and Polish origins (his mother was a cousin of the composer Karol Szymanowski, whereas the famous pianist and pedagogue Heinrich Neuhaus was his nephew). He was in close contact with the musical giants of his age: Tchaikovsky, Glazunov, Borodin and Lyadov. Like many composers of the so called Silver Age, the majority of Blumenfeld’s compositions are for the piano. His music is rooted in the late Russian Romantic tradition in which a national voice can be heard, while the pianistic writing is undeniably inspired by Chopin, though also the influence of other composers such as Adolf von Henselt and Franz Liszt may be traced. Much of his output also shows the influence of Wagner in its bold chromaticism. Rimsky-Korsakov exercised the most formative influence on the young Blumenfeld, introducing him to fellow Silver-Age composers and to the influential publisher Belaieff, who recognised the young pianist’s talent and then issued many of his works. Even in his mid 20s Blumenfeld began teaching at the St. Petersburg Conservatoire but resigned in protest at Rimsky-Korsakov’s dismissal following the senior composer’s support of the protestors killed in the Bloody Sunday massacre of 1905. At length he returned to his post but left for Kyiv on the outbreak of the Russian revolution, and became rector of the conservatoire founded by Mykola Lysenko (where he taught Horowitz). Chopin, Wagner and other Romantic-era masters all make their presence felt in the surging melodies and passionate harmonies of Blumenfeld’s own music. Published in 1892 by Belaieff and dedicated to Rimsky-Korsakov’s wife, the Op. 17 form a quintessential work of Slavic late Romanticism. They are structured in four books of six preludes, touched with the solemnity of Orthodox chant at points and often aspiring to a grand and tragic idiom despite their relative brevity and tending towards melancholy even in the major-key pieces. The Op. 17 Preludes are complemented in this new recording by Blumenfeld’s Study for the left hand, Op. 36 – relatively familiar as an example of the technique and widely promoted by the likes of Godowsky and Lewenthal. The Op. 24 Etude de concert is a dazzling accumulation of piano sonority requiring the deftest of hands and care over voicing to bring its towering chords to life. The 24 Preludes, Op. 17 are clearly modeled on Chopin’s Op. 28. While much of the pianism is Chopinesque, it is often expanded upon, with technical devices taken further, while the music itself is undeniably Russian in its adoption of folk song and orientalism. © Piano Classics

Texas-based Christian rock/emo-metal quintet Flyleaf’s sophomore release jettisons the raw, punk-infused angst of its platinum-selling debut, replacing it with a thick, punchy theatricality that is as progressive as it is radio-ready. Fueled by the electrifying voice of Lacey Mosley, who can build a city with a single soaring note and then tear it down with a lone caterwaul, Memento Mori (musically, at least) owes more to the tech-heavy, similarly faith-based King's X than it does the moody atmospherics of Evanescence, but there’s enough angst and obsession here to draw fans of the latter. At 14 songs, most of which bust out the gate with guns blazing, it can be hard to differentiate, especially when the group sticks to the formula of heavy riff/verse/heavy riff/chorus, but between the moody single "Again" and the alternately laid-back and elegiac closer "Arise," the five members of Flyleaf have come awfully close to finding and defining their voice.© James Christopher Monger /TiVo

What a treat to have a first solo album from Philippe Pierlot, the Belgian viola da gamba player best known for being the director of the Ricercar Ensemble, and what a double treat for it then to sound so absolutely ravishing. In programming terms alone, “Meditation” is a joy for its combination of variety and musicological storytelling. A charting of the viola da gamba’s time in the sun via the music of its finest exponents, it opens with a selection of airs from Tobias Hume’s (1579-1645) The First Part of Ayres of 1605, which was the first complete collection of pieces for solo viola da gamba to be published on British shores. From there it’s a hop over the Channel to celebrate the instrument’s heyday in France. First for a handful of sarabandes and courantes, plus a chaconne, from Monsieur de Sainte Colombe (1640-1700). Then Les Voix humaines by Marin Marais (1656-1728), before returning to British shores for a few pieces by Carl Friedrich Abel (1723-1787), whose love for the fast-becoming-unfashionable viol saw him adapt his own pre-Classical style to something closer to that of his family friend and onetime teacher Johann Sebastian Bach. Pierlot then winds things up with his own transcriptions of two German works – the Prélude, Sarabande and Menuet from Bach’s Cello Suite No. 1 in G major, and a Meditation for harpsichord piece that Johann Jakob Froberger wrote on a trip to Paris in 1660. Recorded in Santa Maria di Micciano, the performances themselves have been captured with vibrant-toned intimacy, and a nice amount of church acoustic in the mix; and while there’s audible breathing, I’m inclined to think that it’s worth it for the pleasure of being really able to appreciate the timbres of hair catching – and of subtle mid-bow modulations in weight and attack – on gut string. Pierlot’s Thomas Allred 1635 viola da gamba meanwhile fully lives up to the viola da gamba’s ‘ambassador’ nickname with its mahogany’s sweetness, and Pierlot’s actual playing is as beguiling in the rhythmic rise and fall of an up-tempo Sarabande as in his programme’s many slower-spun lyrical moments. As for the album title, this refers to the programme’s first and last pieces, which serve as an ear-pricking way to finish by coming full circle, while having moved to an altogether different and more exotic place in stylistic and harmonic terms. Don’t leave too soon either, because as the Froberger’s final chord dies away there’s an inspired postscript in the form of far-off church bell chimes. © Charlotte Gardner/Qobuz

Ondine's release of orchestral music by Kaija Saariaho includes three large-scale works written between 2002 and 2007. Two are concertos -- Notes on Light is for cello and Mirage is a double concerto for soprano and cello -- and Orion is her largest orchestral work. These pieces reveal Saariaho at the height of her powers; they were written with absolute assurance and control of her material, and they explore intriguing aural territory. Like many of her pieces, they are mysterious and allusive, suggestive rather than expository. The exquisite delicacy and subtlety of the textures she creates account for much of the sensual appeal of her music. The three-movement Orion refers to both Orion the mythological hunter and the constellation that bears his name. Its shimmering second movement, a magical evocation of the night sky, is especially attractive. Notes on Light, which was written for soloist Anssi Karttunen, colorfully explores various aspects of light in its five movements, "Translucent, secret," "On fire," "Awakening," "Eclipse," and "Heart of Light." Mirage features both soprano and cello, but the voice inevitably takes aural precedence, both because of its timbral distinctness and the attention the text calls to it. The composer's setting of the mystical English text, by Maria Sabina, is not particularly apt from a technical standpoint, but it allows soloist Karita Mattila to soar with gorgeous fullness and warmth over the orchestra. The cello functions primarily as an obbligato, weaving a layer of textural richness under the voice. Christoph Eschenbach leads Orchestre de Paris in luminous performances that convey both the spontaneity of the composer's vision and the precision with which she expresses it. Ondine's sound is lively and present.© TiVo