Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

The way we carry on after we lose perhaps the one that we may have called muse, or in at least found sharing our ideas with passion, is shrouded in the feeling of absence, the mystery of the ghost guiding our mind to finish the job in hand, it is a presence that is welcome, required when it feels as if the world cannot continue in the same vein and one that feels the loss everywhere, that knows instinctively the value of being Omniabsent and what darkness and melancholia can be achieved.

Loss is a powerful emotion in which at times we can feel the pull of the reins is too cruel and unkind to do anything but rise to the feeling of memory and live within its powerful sedative quality for a while. Loss is brutal but it can lead to discovery, its remorseless pounding on the soul can open up avenues once thought closed off, or at least faded into a kind of gloom in which you would not enter alone. It is a such loss felt by Vincent vd Bosch as he brings together the work of his and his friend Agosh, one cut short initially the sad passing of the latter in 2011, but now completed, one that makes the feeling of being everywhere absent a true reflection of human endurance to see a project through.

It is in the dark and mysterious realms of grief that we perhaps find a reason to create art, the act of bereavement acting as a kind of catalyst, a resurrection of will in which those left behind may initially find difficult to come to terms with but in which, if given time, can be seen as a vital piece in which to celebrate life, and the memory of those that have passed; for they may be absent, but they are truly everywhere.

In atmospheric tracks such as solitude, Crossroad’s Dead End, Agonized, Staring at the Abyss and Omnigone, Omniabsent’s self-titled album is recognised as pure, encompassing, acknowledging the fact that there is a part of us missing, part of us that needs to live on and play the tune created.

An album that is testament to the sheer will of the human experience, one that always needs to be fulfilled and be urged to carry on being creative.

Ian D. Hall