PALE - The Night, The Dawn And What Remains

Please have tissues ready. PALE have returned with an album - written to defy death. Formed in '93, the band ended musical togetherness 16 years later. Cancer diagnoses brought them back together. If not now, when? So the guys got together and wrote what they could. Blood and sweat and tears produced 'The Night, The Dawn and What Remains'. The race against time, however, was only partially successful. Singer Christian died. All the more significant that this was not the end. It was just one more reason to release these sound pearls. A monument to friendship beyond death.

The way you spend your days is the way you spend your life

Spotlight on. The curtain rises. Wherever you will Go is the instrumental introduction to this unspeakably beautiful album. The sounds ripple softly at first, then the tempo picks up, guitars tell all we need to know. This piece of music alone is art.

Tonight (We Can Be Everything) is a duet by the two lead singers. It spreads an atmosphere of naive cheerfulness of friendships that last forever. New York puts one on top and celebrates wanderlust - keyword bucket list. I can already see us packing our bags.

All The Good Good Things is one of my favorite pearls. The drive, which I simply miss in some songs, is more than present here. A pearl perfect for rocking out. But the band can also be gentle. 500 Songs is a sweet love duet with Saskia Pasing about the joys of finding oneself in the end. Yes, behind the hard shell there is a soft core.

Good mood is also spread in the song Still You Feel, a duet with singer Simon den Hartog. A song about how nothing can stop you. And representative of an album that is as heartwarming as mulled wine with a shot. You get a little drunk from these sounds and in the end you love them all. I'm not sure if PALE fans will settle for just a revival album. After all, they have 20 lives...

On the subject of life

Bigger Than Live is the farewell song of singer Christian. When you know that his days are numbered and you hear this song, a tear of emotion comes up for the more tender hearted. I have to think of Fredy Mercury's Who wants to live forever. A farewell song that takes up the certainty of finiteness and yet leaves no room for sadness. We go down dancing - with timpani and trumpets!

My favorite pearl of the album is Wake Up! A wake-up call for conscious living. Afterwards, it can all be over. Such touching piano pearl tones, coupled with serious words and a lightness that floats above the melancholy. The last song follows, a very last song for and about the band and then...

...then the light goes out again. The curtain falls.

Listen and Love