Once you've been amazed with the musical style and prowess of a certain creator, it is difficult to be detached from it. I remember being appalled by the track and video of Gotterdammerung, which I found both disturbing and amazing at the time when I heard it some years ago. Now after being witness to "Sieben" the seventh album by SCHWARZER ENGEL, released just a few months ago I can witness how the project originated In Germany, has evolved to its current point involving a flawless production along with how compelling it is that all the songs are mainly composed and put together by only one person in the figure of Dave Jason the originator and driving force for the band ever since it began with Apokalypse, The debut album of the band which was released in 2010, after being visited by a black angel flying over a battlefield plagued with war casualties that inspired him to baptize the band after such vision. The project came to life and has produced several materials by this band located in Stuttgart over the years in the form of seven albums and 5 EPs with as many different approaches to the subgenres as the tracks in each creative musical material by the black angel.

With elements that merge Neue Deutsche Harte (which is more and more present in the band with each passing record), Black Metal and Gothic Rock, the album begins with an industrial crossover sound that erupts with the opening track "VII", including the bleeding electronic keyboard and gothic environment that dig deep into the low notes of a mysterious opening track that enables the listener to be aware of what is left to come for the rest of the record, when with a voice that evokes the bent out proportion shapes that are everywhere around us as soon as we walk into this gothic musical universe gives way to "Kreuziget  Mich"  which stands for "Crucify Me" and is one of the first singles of this record as well as a natural follow-up to the opening track and a quite electrifying bridge to the remaining of the album, finding an outstanding contrast in "Paradies" a song that produced a sense of melancholy and that makes me think of death and abandonment; the low key in which it is created really does deliver when it comes to making the listener part of a stark yet gorgeous setting; The song contains elements of that realization that you are and always have been, alone and despite being sometimes surrounded by what you think or choose to be your acquaintances you only have yourself when the push comes to shove and you know music is one of the things that will always be there for you.

A contrasting and fulfilling album with a great sense of rhythm, may be less shocking than its predecessors but more pragmatic and direct according to the concept which the creativity of SCHWARZER ENGEL is trying to pursuit in this year 2022 and mostly the upcoming future.