1 of 1 thought this review was well writtenAblaze My Sorrow improves greatly on this release. A much better produced and recorded album. The musicianship is greatly improved, the guitars have a much better tone. Song writing is a lot more stronger. The new vocalist is a lot more stronger sounding, a lot more diverse. Just an all around improvement on this album. Especially from their second record "The Plague" which was a major disappointment.
The guitars this time around are more centered at just a melodeath sound, and with none of the folky sound parts like on "If Emotions Still Burn". Better written and placed solo's, way more memorable this time around. The guitars blaze with fury and sometimes even gentle melodies in a chorus. What was best on their debut is pretty much found here, its like they took out the bad and kept the good. But plenty is done wrong. A few of the songs are poorly written or some of the riffs are like left overs. Seems like they ran out on ideas for a few songs, especially they can sound alike a lot of the time. But a really great refreshing idea is in "Machine Supreme" starting out with sounds a war. Artillery, machine guns, screams of dying men and right before the tremolo picking starts some yells "Incoming!" right as a heavy machine gun fires with the guitars, sounds perfect.
The vocals are greatly improved, with a new vocalist. A deep rasp growl/scream, lows and highs, and some mids. His lyrics are what a really interesting on this album. Some could consider them a bit controversial, like Suicide.
"I focus on the strength
The strength I'm building up inside
I feel it growing stronger every day
Strong enough to take my life away"
For the most part like most melodeath albums, its filled with pessimistic lyrics.
The drums a think do a lot better than the debut. A lot more interesting and creative fills. Definitely sounds a lot better, the drum tone is pretty standard and it works and sounds a lot better than they did on the debut. The bass though has a bit less of presence. For the most part it really doesn't do much nor is it really that audible. The bass does get a good intro on Paradies. The production greatly improved on this from the past 2 records. A lot stronger, better tone overall on on the instruments. Though the mixing in my opinion could have been a lot better. As the bass isn't that audible.
This record improved their sound greatly, but didn't give us much more of anything greatly different. Better song writing just worked out in the end making this album really enjoyable. Something for fans of melodeath to check out if they are looking for melodeath they haven't heard.
