Nightingale is Dan Swano of Edge of Sanity with his guitars, a keyboard and a drum machine. I believe in later hours he acquired an actual backing band, but this entire album was recorded over 7 days in January. Essentially Swano had a fascination with goth rock (esp the Sisters of Mercy), and thus decided to spend a week or so recording an album. This is the result.
And you might be surprised to find, it is actually pretty good.
Packaging wise, it looks as cheap as you would expect a CD made in a week would look - red skulls gape out from the otherwise black cover, whilst the name "nightingale" sits above them in one of those ugly shadow fonts. Inside, a simple fold with over saturated colour and red font on black that renders it kind of difficult to read. Actually, it looks like the only working colours in the printer were black, red and blue. Hrm...
First track, "Nightfall Overture" opens with a swelling of keyboards and, combined with, the preprogramed beat of a drum machine a fairly artifical sound. Swano's voice, however, is lush and low, although also to reach slightly higher pitches. The music is variable and interesting and does not sound entirely programed.
The drum machine kicks us into "Sleep..." with its regular beats - beats that could be straight from the Sisters. It is repetitive, and somehow also hypnotic.
Picking up the pace slightly, is "The Dream Reader" which has a rather nice swooping bridge and quite a lot of keyboards. Like "Sleep" it is quite a hypnotic sound, very pleasant to listen to. The keyboards bring it to life.
"Higher than the Sky" has a slightly heavier beat, and a very nice keyboard melody. Makes one think a little of gliding through the sky, soaring around clouds and rising on thermals. Peaceful, almost serene.
Finally, some guitar - acoustic guitar I believe, adding a far more authentic touch to "Recovery Opus." It's something of a ballad - and seems to be about how the narrator has recovered from insanity. Or have they?
"It's a mess here in my head... so I'll do what the voices say..."I guess not...
"The Return to Dreamland" is an actual instrumental - or possibly Swano didn't feel like singing along while playing his guitar. And there seem to be actual drums - unless a drum machine has a "drum roll" function? It's a slow paced, dreamy number with a few faster moments.
Probably the finest track on this album is "Gypsy Eyes" which is one of the few that I have actually danced to (in fact, we've played it at a few parties). The drum machine is back in force, but the pace is good, the lyrics interesting. Very 80s and very synth-goth. Maybe that's why it seems to be quite popular.
The vocals are very low and deep in "Alone?" Heavy with melancholy, and the light de-de-de of the accomapnying music accentuates the gloomy air. It sounds to me like Swano has accidentally "killed" his imaginery friend/voices in his head and this becomes more frantic, desperate and tinged with madness as it reaches the ending:
"...but it's not my shadow... it's not my shadow..."The drum machine is back in "Lesson in Evil". There seems to be a theme of insanity and mental illness in these lyrics. Makes you wonder? They're somewhat sinister.
The album closes with "Eye for an Eye" which has the same smooth vocals, pleasant sound and somewhat macabre lyrics. The shadow is back, making me wonder if there is an ongoing theme running through this album - almost like a concept album.
For a one-man-one-week project created in his home studio, this is a pretty decent album. It's definitely different from Edge of Sanity (although the lyrics indicate that the narrator is approaching that edge) and proves that Swano can sing - and sing very well indeed. However, it could be improved manifold if Swano also happened to play the drums. Which he does, on later albums. Cos the slightly tinny, very electronic repetitive beat of the drum machine is no substitution for the real thing.
Let's go with a rating of 6.5/10.
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