|
|||||||
Six years after its foundation and the following releases of two EPs, the German six-headed act leads to its debut-album comprising nine tracks produced by Dark Millennium's Hilton Theissen and accompanied by three official music videos. Lyricwise and musically there is abundant roaming among disparate topics and music styles; as to the lyrics, they cover themes such as damnation, the afterlife, pain and atheism, feeling different, always young and uncapable of finding one's way, two soulmates rejoinging their relationship subsequently a long research, the band's comeback, a meeting with an angel stuck on earth, mankind's fall from grace and its isolation on a planet dominated by wars. The music starts speaking from "Fortune", a melodic Symphonic Metal song reminding vast spaces seen from above and matched by an official video telling a story of positive values spread from one person to another ("https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QOcbMWmBbNA"); here the singer displays his range of vocals, reaching lower ones pretty smoothly, while the rhythm occasionally speeds up veering towards Epic and Folk Metal. The keyboards and drums parts are the ones that definitely stand out, while delicate guitar strokes and double vocal layers need a mention, too. An acoustic ending closes the song fading out. "Mirrorplain" possesses a Gothic Metal intro, while the rest of the song is feisty and rugged. Dynamic drumming, Iron Maiden-influenced central licks, Speed/Power Metal accelerations all contribute to decorating the track and making it less foreseeable and indeed one of the best arranged ones; still, it's the keyboard player to be the protagonist of the composition from beginning to end, duelling with the guitar also when the rhythm changes. The almost title track "Salvation" (and its associated video rich in pro visual effects "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nLFP1zVli9I") can count on a catchy refrain, a fast axe solo, rapid drumming, a trilling key solo. It also briefly contains the most wicked vocals of the album, pretty Machine Headian to my ears, whereas the long "Eternal Jack" is rich in chiaroscuros, encompassing a sweet partially Country Rock guitar solo. A ballad with a riff very close to Metallica's "Nothing Else Matters", "Reparation" still remains a convincing well-conceived track, containing a long guitar solo which continues in the background when the vocals return. |
|||||||
![]() |
|||||||
|
|||||||
MARKUS GANZHERRLICH - December 10th, 2018 | |||||||
| |||||||