By John Bedard
With some albums, it sounds like a lot of work goes into them. Motivation, blood, sweat, and tears. Sometimes that creates a very good album and sometimes people are overworked and burn out negatively affecting the product. However, the old saying of “do something you love and you will never work a day in your life” comes to mind. This whole album does not sound like anyone was having to force themselves to do anything. It is effortless and full of passion. The whole thing just sounds like the band was completely relaxed and just enjoying themselves. That is how you make something truly great! This is a work of love and it really stands out.
Madeleine’s vocals are powerful yet still soft and soothing most of the time but are occasionally driven a little harder to a slight breakup that is really well done. This is complemented perfectly by a very dark and unique growl from Rikard. The tone he achieves is so much darker than other singers that come to mind. He has a deep throaty tone that I have not heard anywhere else before. It reaches a level of aggression that is hard to describe. Combining that with Madeleine’s voice was brilliant as that contrast is fantastic! It is like hot fudge on ice cream.
The music is what you would expect with symphonic metal. You have that big orchestral sound mixed with heavy guitar and drums. However, they did make an interesting choice in having, in the case of one song, one version of it that was with both the guitars and the orchestra, but they also have a version of it with just the orchestra. I thought it was strange to set it up that way, but it was rather cool. You could hear how much of a difference it makes and both versions of the song sounded pretty unique and both worthwhile instead of just being a repeat.
I really enjoyed this album but, in some ways,, it is a hard recommend. The reason is you have a symphonic only edit of ‘Hell Moon’ we have ‘All Shall Burn’ and a symphonic edit of ‘All Shall Burn’ there is one new track called ‘Enemies’ and a cover of ‘Mein Herz Brennt’, that in truth I liked better than the original, but that is it. All of it is really great but there just is not all that much. It is worth it to check this one out, absolutely, but make up your own mind if there is enough here to be worth the purchase.
- ‘All Shall Burn’ is released today (Friday 22 November). You can get your copy HERE.
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