By Jason Walker
Delain have always been a favourite of mine since seeing them at Sonisphere quite a number of years back while they were on their ‘April Rain’ album tour cycle way back in 2010, and it was a fantastic performance too. I’ve always had a soft spot for symphonic metal combining often crushing riffs with often orchestral backing and soaring operatic vocals and Delain’s performance back then was no different.
Delain’s forthcoming ‘Apocalypse & Chill’ is their sixth album and sporting a title that’s an amusing play on some internet meta humour, focuses on some current topics over the state of the world and people’s general indifference to it. For a music project that’s spanning almost 20 years (15 years if you count the band being properly formed in earnest with current singer, Charlotte), it’s fantastic to see that Delain are still going strong and releasing quality music and maintaining their hallmark epic sound.
‘Apocalypse & Chill’ comes in at 13 tracks, 16 if you count the extra orchestral arrangements which are definitely worth a listen. As with their previous work, Charlotte’s incredible vocals are right at the forefront, juxtaposed by the aggressive chugs of Timo’s guitar work yet complemented by Martijn’s excellent synth melodies. ‘One Second’ does an excellent job of setting the tone of the album with Otto getting almost equal vocal duties in this regard with Charlotte providing operatic vocal melodies during the choruses.
‘We Had Everything and ‘Chemical Redemption’ as follow-ups to the opener go in quite heavy with synth work and the vocal duty leans far more heavily towards focusing on Charlotte with some beautiful harmonisation effects. Now if you want to hear a fantastic example of Charlotte’s range, ‘Burning Bridges’ has everything, melodies during the verse which lead to epic, soaring lines in the chorus, man I hope this is on the live set!
Through ‘Vengeance’, ‘To Live Is To Die’, and ‘Let’s Dance’ one thing I am really latching onto is how chunky yet incredibly crisp the guitar work is on this album, every chug is thunderous, every little supporting melody is clear and the guitar solos are intense. The best bit is that in spite of this, it doesn’t overpower the bass on the low end, the drums sound excellent as well and even down to the bass drum, absolute clarity.
‘Creatures’ and ‘Ghost House Heart’ signal the move into the latter half of the album and the tone of these takes on a more melancholy note with ‘Ghost House Heart’ moving into straight ballad territory. ‘Masters of Destiny’ and ‘Legions Of The Lost’ continue with the melancholy sound but seem altogether more aggressive in their tone.
‘The Greatest Escape’ and ‘Combustion’ as the last two tracks actually come off as fully sad songs in their sound, and wrap up an album that’s moved from desperation and aggression to almost hopelessness in the end as an observation on humanity’s headlong plunge into disarray. ‘Apocalypse & Chill’ fulfills it’s motive as a range of emotions and serves as a unique plea from these Dutch metallers.
As an additional treat, the orchestral bonus tracks on this album are definitely worth checking out as it showcases the musical ability of this band in a very unique manner. These sorts of arrangements probably wouldn’t be too out of place in a fantasy movie such as Lord of the rings or even music that would be used in games such as Final Fantasy.
Overall this album is another great entry in Delain’s pretty chunky discography and is a testament to the solid, tireless work that Delain put in as a premier symphonic metal band. Will be giving this quite a number of spins in the hope that I can actually learn some of the words in preparation for seeing them live soon at the Ritz in Manchester. It’s been many years since I’ve seen them in person but i’m really buzzed to hear some of these tracks done live!
- ‘Apocalypse & Chill’ is released next Friday (7 February). You can get your copy HERE.
Delain return to the Über Kingdom next week for a series of four dates:
- Thursday 6 February – Birmingham, O2 Institute
- Friday 7th February – Manchester, O2 Ritz
- Saturday 8th February – Bristol, Anson Rooms
- Sunday 9th February – London, Electric Brixton
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