It’s been some time since I’ve heard something as obviously plaintive and mournful as “Akrasia”. Even in Dark Ambient circles, it has become a habit to fill arrangements to the brim with layers of effects and glistening musical objects, either to direct attention to otherwhise subconscious elements or to draw the listener in even more as he stumbles for points of reference. On his debut album, Markus Lonebrink sees no necessity for such implicit action.

His motto on this collection of unashamed dirges seems to be that there is no use in trying to hide your tears. Long synthesizer chords rise up from a deep well, billowing like orchestral strings lit in neon moonlight, perfumed by the sweet scent of regret. As they ebb away, the void fills the cavities left in their wake, before a new wall of sorrowful harmonics floods the vacuum.

There are seven tracks on “Akrasia” and almost every single one is composed along the lines of this technique. Instead of moving forward, the music is marking time, unable to change and too afraid to surrender. But within this forever immobile continuum, there is a final chance for certainty: Lonebrink is not interested in what happens between two chords, but in the turbulences and the drama occuring within each of them and this focus leads the listener back to himself.

The term Akrasia defines the issue of a weak will: How can one keep on doing things that are obviously wrong? The album offers a convincing answer: Because they may have their attractions. Maybe it didn’t feel entirely right to Markus Lonebrink to compose such an obviously desolate work. But the result is certainly something to be cherished, rather than to be regretted.

By Tobias Fischer

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