And my career as a writer for Teufel’s Tomb starts in a fashion not to dissimilar to a gaggle of clown cars falling on top of my prone form after I’ve been hit with a train full of group-home escapees and nympho-fecalphilliacs. As I’m listening to Giving Yourself Away from Rotterdam’s chief musical export (I assume); Officium Triste, I can’t help but think that hanging myself can’t be this depressing… and by "depressing" I mean "long and pointless and makes me wanna rape my face."

Officium Triste play long, slow, self-conscious-yet-somehow-oblivious-to-irony goth metal in the vein of early Tiamat, early My Dying Bride, and whatever other band was good when they were early… only Officium Triste are like 12 years too late for the "Dead Man’s Party"… and are also total sucking at being 12 years too late for the "Dead Man’s Party" (yup… an Oingo Boingo reference. Fuck you). The song titles are faggy-goth-kid bad; "My Charcoal Heart", "On the Crossroads of Souls", and the lyrics are too ruthlessly ludicrous for print… so here they are;

"My heart is in pain
The feelings for you won’t be the same.
My heart, a diamond it won’t be,
black, like coal, all you will see."

- from "My Charcoal Heart"

Awwww… someone’s parents just don’t understand his black-as-raven-taint soul.

Don’t get me wrong… I’m all about staring at your shoes so the moon light will catch your dyed black hair just right, I just don’t like the half-ass poetry and contrived "make me sad" riffs that are the moldy bread and chewy butter of Officium Triste’s reason for living-to-hate-living. These are the kind of people who say they’re going to kill themselves, but then they don’t because there’s not enough clouds in the sky or enough black cats strewn about or some such shit. If you are this ass-fuck miserable, than just slice your wrists in a bathtub with your Lady Bick and leave me the cunt alone.

Written By: Nick Benoitschwitz