It's been quite a while since I last listened to Pain of Salvation - outside of the excellent To The Shoreline (off Road Salt Two), which has nested in my ears for years now.
I wish I knew why, but the two Road Salt albums simply went past me and did not tickle my fancy.
The recently released video for Meaningless, however, has reignited the old spark in me and it's pretty much the only song I've been listening to for roughly two days now. According to my music player it has been played for 61 times as of writing these lines, which does not include the roughly twenty times I've watched the video. It's been a while since I've listened to one song exclusively, usually that's a prestige reserved for full albums. In the Passing Light of Day won't be out until January, however, so this will have to do.
Oh, and how it does.
The first thing that drew me in is the hardly defineable, apparently sampled - or at least processed - motif that lingers somewhere between the sound of bagpipes, a string instrument, and vocalised 'ah's.
Over the course of a minute, this motif builds itself up into heavier and heavier sections - until it is dropped semi-abruptly in favor of a more eerie, calmer verse section, which in turn promises to turn itself into something heavier at its end.
Instead, the first part of the chorus is accompanied by smooth, almost gentle instrumentation - not to speak of Gildenlöw's honey-like voice.
The chorus is repeated immediately in a harsher fashion, and this is where one of my favorite parts come in: the second layer of vocals - sung by Ragnar Zolberg, I assume - adds an intruiging harmony. I admit that I wasn't familiar with Zolberg's vocals, so I was easily tricked into perceiving female vocals. Maybe that's by design, given how androgynous Zolberg's appearance is in the music video.
The result is wonderful, at any rate, which makes the scream that breaks the chorus down all the more bitter-sweet, not just in preparation for what's to come.
Verse number two settles in right behind said scream and warps the previously eerie, but calm section into something far more menacing, albeit rather short.
For the second chorus, there's no build up this time around, and as it transitions into a final section the motif from the song's intro returns, mirroring its evolution there in brief and launching my favorite part of this song.
Gildenlöw's desperate pleas, at first whispered and later thrown in defiance against the instrumental background as if threatened to be drowned by it - which, given how heavily layered the music eventually grows, isn't just a metaphor.
If I could change one thing about the song, it would be the very end. Gildenlöw builds himself up to one final exasperation... and then subverts it completely by basically speaking the last word in a normal voice, negating the build up and all expactations once again.
Of course this has been a common theme throughout the song: the motif only being used for the first and last minute, the smooth chorus standing in stark contrast to the creepy verse passages, or the transition between the first chorus' first iteration and the second verse being especially jarring.
Still, aesthetically speaking, I could do without that final subversion.
My high-level nitpicking matters little in the end, as it does not take anything away from the song's quality or appeal. It's a glorious near-five minute rollercoaster ride that warrants paying close attention to all the little details and nuances, and my music player's counter will surely show a three digit number before I will begin to tire of this song.
You can watch the official video on YouTube: Pain of Salvation - Meaningless
