Some Would Say Delerium Sold Out...

...but they would be wrong. Yes, back in the early nineties Delerium was an ambient project of instrumentals with dark synth rhythms and industrial-influenced drums layered in ethereal pads and chant samples(the stuff is awesome- if interested check out Delerium's 2 Archives double-disk collections)

Some of this can be heard on the Semantic Spaces album(where Flowers Become Screens and Incantation are from) but that album was a turning point for Delerium. Kristy Thirsk provided the element missing from the Delerium package: Angelic Vocals for some of these songs.

Bill leeb and Rhys(pronounced 'Reece') Fulber have been involved with MANY projects over the years(for info, check out mindphaser.com) and in fact, the duo continued to make the same music from early Delerium, but changed the name to SYNAESTHESIA.

With the release Karma came an interesting concept- What if some songs written would feature a guest vocalist? Not just any vocalist, but the RIGHT vocalist for the right song? Enter Sarah Mclachlin, Camille Handerson(Sarah's live back-up singer), the returning vocalist Kristy Thirsk, etc. Things were definitely going a bit more commercial, but guess what? No one else was taking the standard idea of New Age music and transforming it into a new breed of music. Using key vocalists, grooving bass lines, incorporating live guitar and drums with samples and chants to create an absolute mood.

Which leads us directly to Poem, where there were almost no instrumental tracks, and the album hosted vocals by Leigh Nash(sixpence none the richer), Joanna Stevens(Solar Twins), Jenifer McLaren, Matthew Sweet, among others. The songwriting and production was amazing and Delerium was getting closer to what I think it's goal was: Get that right voice for the song.

With their latest album Chimera, Bill and Rhys find themselves in the company of yet another incredible line-up of vocalists with Leigh Nash retuning for two tracks, Kristy Thirsk, Jael(Lunik), Zoe Johnston(Faithless, Bent), Margaret far, Nerina Pallet, and Julee Cruise, among others- again, only two instrumentals. The song 'After All' is the perfect mix of dance, new age, and pop and it features some chant samples in the middle! Who else does that?? The track was made for radio.

Okay enough history lesson.

This Best Of collection will give you a great idea of where Delerium came from to what it is still morphing into. The new tracks, 'Paris' and 'You and I' are very strong tracks. the only drawback to this collection is that some of the tracks are edited, so they are shorter. I am one for the six munite song- as long as there is a reason it is six minutes long. Delerium has songs in excess of 9 minutes- but I never wish they were shorter. If you are interested in any of the guest vocalists here, take a listen because you probably have never heard them singing in the style they do with Delerium. The Best Of album is fantastic, but don't limit your Delerium collection to just that because you'll be missing out on all the mind-blowing material on all their releases.

I was lucky enough to see Delerium live here in Chicago on the only tour they've done(Rhys's solo project Conjure One opened the show...also amazing)and I've never been more impressed at a show- EVER. Kristy Thirsk and Shelly Harland traded back and forth on lead and back-up vocals for the show. It was a wonderful blend of live guitar, bass, drums, and vocals and electronic components and samples. These guys really are

talented.

Kind of disappointing

Don't get me wrong, I love Delerium--every time I get an album of theirs, I can't wait to put it through several listens, and this was no exception. Unlike some of the fans, I enjoy both their older works and the new, poppier direction they started with Poem and applied even heavier to Chimera. I was hoping to get a handful of my favourites compiled onto one CD, and in this case, it succeeded.

However, it came as a disappointment that nearly each greatest hit track was a jarring radio edit, or dance remix. Having heard the originals, they were the ones I really appreciated, which just made the cuts and omissions even more noticeable. Furthermore, I don't really care for the 2 new tracks "Paris" and "You and I"--anywhere else, I'm not sure it'd be considered a hit.

Some will appreciate the edits and remixes, but I could not, try as I might. It felt as if they were unwilling to give away all of their best-loved songs so easily, filling it with different versions to try and compensate.

The fading light that is and was Delerium

As a long time fan of Delerium I was shocked and disappointed at the album release 'Chimera'. If one has listened to Delerium from it's conception as a industrial/gothic/ethereal group with their first release of Forms, Faces & Illusions through to 'Poem', the listener would be able to tell the difference between the early Delerium and the new Delerium.



Rhys and Fulber decided to take Delerium more mainstream down the middle and that's fine if they want to try to get more listeners. What's not fine is that the essence of what Delerium is no more. Now it sounds more pop. I gave away Chimera and will be doing the same for this CD.



This CD is really not the best of 'Delerium. It is more a collection of songs from other recent albums. The only two songs worth listening to and which represents the last fading vestiges of the former Delerium and they are Terra Firma and Rememberance. The rest are forgetable