Various Artists A Dark Cabaret

Cabaret, a uniquely performed blend of theatricality and music, popular many years ago as a theatre experience, has been kept alive by those proficient in the voice and style that characterizes the genre.  Its ability to lavish entertainment is heavily dependant on the skill of the performers as well as their ability to craft enjoyable cabaret tunes.  Designed to entertain in the face of threat, at times quite bravely by ridiculing the very danger it was meant to mask, Cabaret was at the heart of decadence by nature of its immersion in clubs drenched in alcohol, adventurous people seeking a flow of good times, and an underlying flavour of fear.  It has become far more than that today, never relinquishing the undercurrent of the very decadence it surveys.

Projekt’s A Dark Cabaret is a disc completely and legitimately filled with the best that can be found on cabaret’s uniquely arrayed platter.  This collection of tracks celebrates the genre by rounding up a heavily talented selection of artists that know the genre.  The artists found on A Dark Cabaret represent different twists that range from straight cabaret to amazingly intricate reworkings that still employ the framework of the featured genre.

It begins with a genuinely entertaining song, “Coin-Operated Boy” by The Dresden Dolls.  It sings, with hilarious results, of the joys of an artificial boy, which doesn’t bring complexity to a relationship but is available on demand; on when needed and desired above real boys.  The Dresden Dolls deliver this song perfectly with piano; you hear it and you’re immediately hooked.  Revue Noir, which features the amazingly unmatched Germanic voice of vocalist Nicki Jaine, who contributes her own track on this compilation, and Sam Rosenthal of Black Tape For a Blue Girl, follows it with “Sometimes, Sunshine.” It delivers a darker form of cabaret than The Dresden Dolls perform. 

A more musically complex tune is available from Katzenjammer Kabarett.  Their contributed “Gemini Girly Song” provides a more gothic-sounding quality than songs preceding the track but prepares the way for the following Audra song, “Cabaret Fortune Teller,” itself a heavier, rock-oriented, change of pace.  Nicki Jaine offers her, “Pretty Faces,” an acoustic piece that frames her amazingly deep and natural, Nico-like voice, and whose stunning beauty adds to the mystique of her persona.

There are many more tracks of cabaret material on this album.  All demand further exploration, generally the grace of sampler compilation albums.  Projekt Records is not a timid label.  It is unafraid of releasing albums featuring music that span vastly unexplored styles that (usually) get little attention.  A Dark Cabaret is a splendid album of choice that can open up a new level of entertainment for the musically adventurous.

Highly recommended. With a very, very nice price, this is a great deal.