Frontiers [Release date 08.12.23]
Classy and classic symphonic metal from Everdawn. Who could ask for more?
This US band made a few waves with their debut, (when they were known as Midnight Eternal), only to have internal disputes lead to the replacement of the band’s vocalist.
It’s an ill wind. Replacement, Russian mezzo soprano, Alina Gavrilenko, has more than filled the gap. Judging by Venera, their second album, she’s added depth and breadth to the band’s symphonic Metal sound.
She has an effortless vocal style, crossing from octave to octave, sometimes double tracked, floating above a continually moving symphonic jigsaw, where all the pieces – vocals, guitars, keys, rhythms – all fit perfectly, then move on.
It’s a hugely ambitious album, continually looking to the stars for celestial inspiration, ‘Venera’ (Venus), ‘Cassiopeia’, ‘Cosmic Star’, ‘Orion’s Belt’. Or examining earthbound dilemmas: life, death and redemption, ‘Samsara’, or examining conscience and morality: ‘Justify The Means’.
Musically, it’s expansive, it blurs the line between rock and classical, utilising the notion of music being a substitute for images…an emotional power, lyrical, technical, dark in places, light in others.
You get the sense that every song is just one step closer to the album’s climactical moment, the 13 minute penultimate track ‘Truer Words Never Spoken’, which eventually erupts into a huge piece of intensely delivered music, like a symphonic orchestra trapped in a small studio by a gifted producer/arranger.
Talking of which, having Tommy Hansen and Eric Rachel involved in the engineering, mixing and mastering adds clarity and density to the band’s music.
Too often, Symphonic Metal albums have too much content and not enough subject. No problem with Venera though, and you just have to admire Everdawn’s ambition. ***1/2
Review by Brian McGowan.
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In this sequence we play ‘The Best of 2024′ GRTR! reviewer selections
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