Review Summary: Discarding the recipe to an album that contains all the right ingredients.
Radium Valley’s second instalment
Tales From The Apocalypse proves to be the equivalent of a sight-seeing tour featuring the elements that make up an atmospheric metal album. It seems that everything necessary for a truly successful release is present, but clearly something went amiss during the amalgamation and frustratingly much of this albums potential is lost due to songwriting problems. That’s not so say Radium Valley fail to deliver; throughout the EP these French musicians execute an array of fantastic ideas and craft an atmosphere that permeates every part of the album, constantly changing and growing as the songs progress. Ultimately, however, the biggest obstacle the band face is their inability to maintain momentum, particularly for the duration of an entire track.
Opener ‘Song of Rain’, for example, begins with a brief sample that reveals information regarding the bombing of Hiroshima while some light piano plays in the background. This then gives way to heavy, chord driven guitar riffs introduced alongside the band’s atmospheric elements, including a multitude of electronic effects and soaring background vocal melodies. Such a combination just demands attention, but it’s attention that Radium Valley neglect to keep. While the track builds strength and maintains interest for a small while longer, the latter half of this and almost every track on the album is plagued by repetition. In the quest to weave an over-arching and pervading atmosphere each song feels stretched out to the point of banality, featuring run-times that cannot be justified by their content. The problem is, Radium Valleys general formula consists of creating an interesting piece of music and then repeating it a second time with a short conclusion tacked onto the end to resolve it. While it may be an effective technique in regards to forming the tone of the album, it can make some of the longer songs difficult to persevere with.
If there’s one component of their sound the band seem intent on capturing, it’s atmosphere. From an assortment of electronic elements such as mournful crooning effect on ‘Behind Me’, to the angelic, soaring choirs on ‘Sweet Infection’, Radium Valley never miss a chance to build upon the ethereal quality of their music. It must be said that this is certainly one of the best handled parts of their music; never overdone or inappropriately placed. It’s certainly the bands greatest asset and, more than anything else, it helps them stand out from their contemporaries in the metal genre. Piano and organ sections appear periodically and develop themes that otherwise would have been difficult to achieve. The band also exhibit some strong industrial influences, most markedly during the opening moments of ‘Sweet Infection’.
Elsewhere, the vocalist proves his worth with his long, drawn out vocal style, contributing greatly to the aforementioned atmospheric quality of the band as a whole. While he too generally falls victim to repetition, he manages some incredible moments nonetheless, especially in the concluding moments of closer ‘Wings of Disease’ which otherwise doesn’t have a lot going for it in terms of content. The guitarist favours a simplistic, chord based approach for the majority of the album, heavily relying upon dragging out his strums while the drummer fills the gaps. On the opposite side of the spectrum, the rhythm section alternates from track to track in terms of quality. On about half the songs the drumming is buried deep in the mix while the bass remains nearly inaudible, the two becoming merely a subdued undercurrent flowing beneath the barrage of electronics and distorted chords. On others, most notably ‘For All of Us’, the bass and drums appear much more prominent and become much more effective because of it. Whether it’s a purposeful production technique or simply a fallacy on the bands part, the rhythm section is inconsistently placed throughout the album.
For what it is,
Tales From The Apocalypse is an enjoyable album full of unique ideas and ambitious plans. It’s clear, however, that the prospect of what could have been is a tantalising idea, and an album plagued by poorly constructed tracks and inconsistent songwriting is an underwhelming resting place for potential. Hopefully, Radium Valley can learn to trim the fat, balance their production and remedy their songwriting in the future. If that can happen, there’s no telling what could be achieved.
