Review Summary: 'Osiris stays the course with their new mainstream approach, but improve upon it in every way.
Born of Osiris has been challenged to live up to the expectations of their first EP
The New Reign and more so their monstrous LP
The Discovery ever since their release. Losing the more technical of the two guitarists, releasing a watered down follow up with a nonsensical name, and having silly keyboard lines as a key trademark make them a clear target as a band whose best days are behind them. If you know Born of Osiris, you know their unique brand of pulsing prog metalcore.
If you are a fan of the band and was pleased with the frankly solid if less exciting
Tomorrow We Die Alive then
Soul Sphere is bound give you what you are looking for. If you hated the band from the first time you heard them, this will just give you more reason to make fun of them. If you like some of their early stuff but didn't like
Tomorrow We Die Alive it's hard to say. This is a respectable step up with more interesting songs and skilled writing but of all their albums it sounds most similar to TWDA.
What sets the album apart from their older releases is just how refined the music is and how melodic and surprisingly hook driven the vocals are. There is a much bigger focus on tracks with melodic choruses now and it just gets more emphasized the further into the album you go.
Throw Me in the Jungle is the worst track on the album with a cringe worthy chorus but other tracks such as
The Louder the Sound, The More We All Believe and
Warlords do the melodic chorus well.
Warlords even manages to change the pacing and tone a little; something that has become nonexistent for the band. The scream vocals go from one catchy line to the next and the interplay between different vocal parts is excellent. They also made things more technical than the last album and put in some brief but pleasing guitar solos. Unlike how in TWDA most songs were all about chugs aside from a few specific points in each song, the cool change ups and great, crushing riffs come often here. Melodic guitars, surgical rhythms, and (my favorite) “tech-ish” rhythm attacks are in abundance showing the band made an effort to be more dynamic.
The Composer is a monster of a track.
Soul Sphere is an album that is extremely accessible and catchy for it's genre and more upbeat sounding than expected. The production is pristine, which again, can be good or bad. Although there are a larger amount of technical parts on this album, the way it's presented definitely makes this their least hardcore to date. For something of a mainstream party prog death band it brings the quality you'd expect. Meaning haters are likely to confirm their suspicions. By taking some of metal's most extreme elements and merging it with pop sensibilities they have created a unique and divisive sound for themselves. The band does tend to sound like they have a set amount of tools that they just mix up from track to track; leading to the question: how long can they keep this up? For now, the songs here are solid enough that those ok with their more mainstream direction should find this to be great Born of Osiris material.
