Amon Amarth - Twilight of the Thunder God

A few days back, I thought of browsing through my music collection to check for updates of some bands. In the course of this pursuit, I found that there's been a new Amon Amarth album, Twilight of the Thunder God. Its been out for a while now (Sept. 2008 release) which means that this is piece is woefully out of date; however, its whats been in my WMP for the last 24 hours, so I thought it deserves a mention here.

First off, something about the band. Amon Amarth are a Death Metal band, whose lyrics are derived from Norse mythology. Twilight of the Thunder God is their seventh studio album. For those of us not familiar with Norse Mythology, the album title speaks of the battle between the Thunder God Thor and the World Serpent, Jormugandr, as is shown in the album artwork below:


Music wise, Id say this is the among the best Amon Amarth. My personal favourite albums were 2002's Versus The World, 2004's Fate of Norns and 2007's With Oden on Our Side. Twilight of the Thunder God features a lot of new things for the band: A slew of high-profile guest performances (Children of Bodom guitarist Roope Latvala performs a shred solo on the title track, Entombed vocalist Lars Goran Petrov on Guardians of Asgaard and Apocalyptica on the track Live for the Kill). Another new addition to this album is that the overall tempo of most songs is quicker, giving the album a more mainstream sound. On the first hearing, its definitely more palatable to the Amon Amarth newbie than say, Versus The World, and songs like Free Will Sacrifice, No Fear for the Setting Sun and even the title track, Twilight of the Thunder God, have a distinctly In Flames ring to them.

Video: Twilight Of The Thunder God

That's not to say that it doesnt stay true to the band's trademark sound; far from it. The riffage and drumming on the other songs is classic Amon Amarth; Power Chord riffs and heavy bass drumming once more feature on the album, in addition to faster solos. Songs in this package to watch out for are Guardians of Asgaard (This song practically got me high out of headbanging... It deserves to be heard on a sound system with a good bass setup) No Fear for the Setting Sun and a special mention for the song Where is your God, which sounds like a fusion of Nevermore and Amon Amarth, definitely a good thing.

A noteworthy point about this album is the production and track listing. The production of the album is definitely better than previous albums, with each track sounding very clean. To get an idea, place Guardians of Asgaard opposite Death in Fire, and you'll get what I'm talking about. Track listing has been done in a way that will get a newbie hooked immediately, while priming him/her properly for the Amon Amarth "sound". This is sure to get a lot of people attracted to the band, and I do expect it to do very well commercially.

Video: Guardians Of Asgaard

Rating:
Lyrics: 8/10, Riffs: 9/10, Solos: 9/10. Overall : 8.67/10
Its a good album, up there with the best of Amon Amarth, like I've already said. I wouldn't call it their best effort though; it is however a unique effort. From a critical point of view, one could accuse the band of having gone for a more mainstream death metal sound. Then again, mainstream death metal is an oxymoron, so there shouldn't be anything to complain about.

Bring Me The Horizon - Suicide Season

Bring Me The Horizon is a British band that takes it name from a line in the POTC movies. When I listened to 'Suicide Season' the first time, my reaction was, 'These guys are pretty good!' And it hasn't changed much despite a couple of hundred listens during cycling sessions. What genre do they belong to? Difficult to say, but the closest would be metalcore. If you don't know what that is, here goes. Metalcore is simply metal where the vocalist screams out the lyrics most of the time. And vocals are BMTH's strongest suit. The singing style has an almost pleading tone to it, which, combined with the added layer of techno-like jingles gives a haunting aspect to some of the songs. 'Suicide Season', the title track is outstandingly good and a perfect example of this. Despite its length (at 8:19 minutes), or perhaps because of it, this is one song that will refuse to budge from your skull.The guitaring is heavy, and coupled with the drumming is rhythmic enough to be almost melodic. Watch out for the softer portions of the songs where the guitars take a break; the alternating of sounds is delightful. The subtle British accent helps too. All the songs are pretty good, but if I were forced to choose, I would recommend 'Chelsea Smile', 'The Comedown' and 'Diamonds aren't forever', apart from 'Suicide Season' of course.

Video: Diamonds Aren't Forever
Video: Chelsea Smile
Video: Suicide Season

RATING: 8.5/10

Opeth - My Arms, Your Hearse

Opeth is a swedish metal band which is can be best described as a wholesome union between Dream Theater's progressive style and Arch Enemy's heavy, harmonic riffs. Formed in 1990, My Arms, Your Hearse is their 3rd studio album.

Now if you're listening to this album, you've either heard songs from previous albums, or you've not. If you've heard the previous albums, what will strike you first is the lack of dual harmonic guitars, which made Orchid and Morningrise hauntingly beautiful, yet powerful death metal albums. Opeth decided to go with more progressive and heavy riffs, and Åkerfeldt (lead guitarist and vocalist) has taken his screaming vocals to a whole new level, while maintaing his clean and whispered vocals. All this meant that it took me a while to get used to the new style the band was playing in this album (read: listening to it start to front about 3 times), but its wonderful to listen to once you get over the fact that this album is not as melancholy as the previous albums, but definitely more eerie in its themes, scales, chords and timing. Its one of the many paradigm shifts the band has undergone during its life.

One way or the other, this is arguably Opeth's heaviest and most progressive album to date. I started listening to Opeth only after hearing Ghost Reveries, which was progressive, yet had death metal influences in it. My Arms... is twice as heavy, twice as complex, twice as fast... Pretty much twice as much in everything. Its an outstanding piece of music, and considering this was made in 1996, I can't help but appreciate the musical genius of Åkerfeldt, because this album is still good and fresh, 13 years down the line.

Oh and lest I forget, most songs in this album are less than 10 mins long, which is short, by Opeth's standards; Most of the bands songs are in the 9 - 16 min bracket. Fluid, elegant, yet hard hitting compositions.

Overall Ratuing: 8.7 /10
PS - You'll agree with the rating if you allow the music to sink in over a period of time; this stuff most probably wont endear itself to you immediately.