Sunday 30 January 2011

Album: The 13th Floor by Sirena

Shuffle on MP3 never seems to do its job but tonight its actually throwing out string of amazing song and it must know its Sirena week! So with it being Sirena week I've shuffled into my old Sirena collection. Anthony has already completed a review of Sirena's Enigma of Life of readable here, but here is my thoughts on their previous album: The 13th Floor.


The Album
Stepping away from Sirena's early work to more 'main stream' 13th floor still maintains its Gothic genera but accessible to many. The album merges the divine vocals of Ailyn (formally on Spanish X-factor, glad to see she was saved!) with a powerful and eerie latin choir and death vocals. Personally I love to see different vocal types merged to create an effect, the 13th floor does this, the death vocals are well placed with Ailyn alluring vocals taking stage backed up by the choir for effect.
Instrumentally its nothing special but neither is there much room to fault it. A multitude of instruments complement the vocals, violin and piano give the symphonic which along with the choir give the album its feel. Generally drumming is nice and heavy complemented with effective rifts,

Notable Tracks
The Path to Decay - The first song and the single taken from this album, the path to decay is a great song, although heavy its very symphonic and accessible.
Sirens of the Seven Seas - One of my all time favourite songs! While this album will never be my favourite this song is on of my all time favourites. It is the only track to be lead by male vocals and they are clear male vocals that eventually blend into grunts as the character of the song succumbs to Sirens. A great song that shows off Sirens full retinue, an amazing end to the album.


Summary
The 13th Floor is kind of album that each song you listen too you think is amazing but they don't stand out in your mind. While this is a good album and has loads of great songs, it just lacks something to make it amazing and I'm struggling to find what that is.

3.8/5 - Not a special album but by no means bad, full of great songs and you wouldn't regret owning it.

Buy it here

Too harsh? Too generous? Please comment bellow :-)






Album: The Enigma Of Life by Sirenia

For his fifth Sirenia project, The Enigma of Life, founder and guitarist Morten Veland seems to have settled on a female vocalist as Spain's Ailyn returns to the mic. once more. The Enigma of Life has all the elements that define Sirenia: symphonic, melodic, and sometimes bombastic metal with signature soaring female vocals and guitar solos. The songs 'This Darkness' and 'A Seaside Serenade' are typical of this formula. Yet, over the course of listening, The Enigma of Life seems to have a more accessible nature, a lively almost melodic rock feel. 'Fallen Angel', 'Darkened Days to Come', and extremely catchy 'Winter Land' swell with foot tapping rock appeal. 'Winter Land' certainly has commercial, radio-friendly, viability.

Having made this assessment The Enigma of Life closes with four songs that could pitch either way. 'Coming Down' and 'This Lonely Lake' couple that rock sensibility with the drama of symphonic metal. 'Fading Star' moves closer to bombastic and melodic black metal with addition of death growls. The closing piece, the title cut, is pure epic symphonic melodic metal. While typical of the genre, the songs on The Enigma of Life are varied and entertaining, having an alluring and unexpected attractiveness. Quite possibly this could be Sirenia's best work.

Having said all this, however, many fans feel that the album is a large departure from Sirenia's previous albums. But my advice to those naysayers is stick with it and you'll see that while still a variation from other albums it follows the progression Sirenia have shown through their albums. It is a classic album following in the sound of After Forever and Nightwish.

Overall
: 4.1/5 - A stunning and evocative album showing that there is still hope for the Female-fronted metal genre. Stick with it and you'll see what I mean!

Disagree or just want to say what you think? Feel free to comment down below ;-)

Saturday 15 January 2011

Album: The Art Of War by Sabaton

Based on Sun Tzu's Art of War this same titled album in corporates extracts into its songs to emphasize their by now well know style of singing about historical battles from the twentieth century. Sun Tzu says "The Art of War is of vital importance to Sabaton. It is a matter of life and death, a road either to safety or to ruin" and in this case it is most certainly a road to safety.

So, what is good about this installment in Sabaton's story? All of the songs are polished and done in the typical 'epic' power metal way - they're either fast rockers with lots of double bass drumming and constant barrages of riffs, such as the opening Ghost Division and 40:1 or they're slower, grim 'power ballads', such as Cliffs of Gallipoli or The Price of a Mile. Relying heavily on Joakim's expressive yet powerful voice to evoke emotion in the listener we can tend to ignore the instrumentals and the music itself but this is rarely the case in this instance as we are swept along to battles past.

The 'glorious' feel most of the songs have is seen by many as a standard of Sabaton songs but here it is taken to a whole new level. Union, Cliffs of Gallipoli and Price of a Mile come to mind immediately. It's mostly achieved through clever use of keyboards giving the songs an operatic atmosphere and quality, Broden's layered vocals give the feel of a wide range of vocalists contributing to the album furthering this feel. In Panzerkampf this 'choir' like style is used to great effect giving the song the feel of a Soviet Military choir.

However, it is notable that the only thing making it stick out from other Sabaton albums is the woman reading exerts from Sun Tzu at the start of each song which gives the premise of each song. There is little or no experimentation or development in the songs but Sabaton do have the obvious luck of having achieved a winning formula early on in their career. The final song on the album 'A Secret' only lasts 37 seconds and seems to be there predominantly for the last 10 seconds where a robot says 'Illegal download detected executing spyware droid...' perhaps a nod towards the current trend of downloading albums off 'questionable' sites?

Overall
: 4.15/5 - An classic installment in Sabaton's history, not for everyone and the lack of originality may annoy you at first but given time it will grow on you and before you know it it'll be on your playlist and you'll randomly start singing the lyrics (hopefully not at awkward moments).

Buy it here

Disagree or just want to say what you think? Feel free to comment down below ;-)

Friday 14 January 2011

Album: Twilight Time by Stratovarius

It seems strange that the first review on this blog is of an album made before I was born! Yet I said I would review the next album I received in the post and this was it! Thats right I did say, in the post.. not downloaded! After all who could resist a proper album when they are for sale for under £4. Given its a in a box lets quickly skim over that.


The Box
The cover for this album is actually quite nice, one of Stratovarius' less garish albums covers! The text is very retro though but it all adds to the feel. It has a very cheep feel though once you take a look around the box, the lyrics are printed in Times New Roman on a white back ground.. and the only band picture is a postage stamp size and very pixilated. Although the plastic thing that the CD clips into was reenforced on my copy which is very good, I've had band experiences with other albums breaking there. For their second album on not much money, I should cut them some slack!

The Album
Now this is very important, as with any early Stratovarius: Listen to the album, Listen to it again.. go to bed wake up listen to it... let the songs sink into your head then play it very loud that evening! It sounds a bit odd but on the first listening of this album I hated it! Same with Dream Space, Fourth Dimension and Episode! Its mostly likely the nature of the genera that does this to you.
'Breaking the Ice' opens the albums with nice heavy punch, which is not Timo's strong point but it works.. just. The rifts as you would expect from stratovarius, very good, and the solos are too.
Besides 'Breaking the Ice', 'Metal Frenzy' is pretty heavy (by my standards!)
Anyone who has listened to Stratovarius will know they tend to include a 7minute + song, this is the song that keeps you coming back and I think for this album I would be 'Madness Strikes at Midnight'  when combined with 'Twilight Time' these tracks have a catchy enough chorus to bring you back in to enjoy this album that you would otherwise probably forget!
Theres no overal feel to the album but the tracks are slotted well together, it is an album not a collection of songs.

Notable tracks
Besides what I've mentioned earlier 'The Hills have Eyes' is an eerie feel, its a fantastic song. Its nice to hear some unusual sounds and despite the crititism that Timo Tolkki gets his voice does range and certainly does not spoil the album, the song has a great beat too it as well.
'Lead us into the light' does not do it for me though, its the classic Stratovarious finisher that could be compared to 'Wings of Tomorrow' or 'We hold the Key' but it just lacks the quality that could have really helped this album.

Summary
If you stick it out this album does reward you, it begin in my iTunes liberary with one star.. then the next day two and now I've raised it to four stars! Thats around what I'm giving this album, 3.75 stars. It lacks the real quality tracks or theme and has some weak links calling a five out of question but it really grew on me. Its a bit forgettable but when you do come back to it, it will be a pleasure. I'd give it four but its bettered by later stratovarius albums.

3.75/5 - Don't judge it too soon, its a must have for Stratovarius fans, but not amazing.

Buy it Here

I'm a big Stratovarius fan so if anyone cares to disagree, please comment away :-)