It seemingly doesn’t matter why and how and what ways GREEN CARNATION start to write music. At the end you will always get a wonderful piece of music. Celebrating their 15th anniversary these excellent Norwegian musicians took the chance to please their fans and themselves with a collection of acoustic songs, since they made the fans mouth watering with some they played during their live performances. Acoustic Verses is – as its title implies – a pure acoustic album, whereas the first both songs Sweet Leaf and The Burden Is Mine... Alone already got released on a very rare EP at the end of the last year. The rest of the album are brand new songs acoustically written and composed right from the beginning. Just to transform already existing tracks for an album wouldn't have been a challenge for a band such as GREEN CARNATION.
Acoustic Verses is a very quiet and reflective album, following the roots of the last both releases. It is dreamy and melancholic but though pretty varied. GREEN CARNATION added three guest musicians (violins) to the ensemble and singer Kjetil Nordhus shares his part more and more with bassist Stein Roger Sordal, leading to fantastic duets and two-voices-singing.
While The Burden Is Mine... Alone only lives on its guitar melodies, songs such as Sweat Leaf, Maybe? and Alone offer full orchestration, including strings, drums and sound samples. Without a doubt one highlight on Acoustic Verses is 9-29-045, separated in three chapters, where the band impressively displays its entire range of composing and songwriting skills. This song flows in perfect harmony. 9-29-045 gets closed with the instrumental Childs Play Part III that actually doesn’t mark the end of this album. With High Tide Waves another and final song follows that bursts the finish and acts sort of misplaced and cumbersome, since this song differs a little stylistically with its darkness and aggressiveness in voice. They better could have put this song aside or taking it as a hidden track with a temporal distance to the rest.
However, with Acoustic Verses GREEN CARNATION have released another mesmerizing album, captivating the listeners from the first tune on and abducting them into its own inner worlds of dreams, pains and visions.