Century Media
2010
1. The Termination Proclamation
2. Your Poison Throne
3. Moonrise
4. And the Maiden Spoke
5. Emptiness Unobstructed
6. The Blue Marble and the New Soul
7. Without Morals
8. The Day You Built the Wall
9. She Comes in Colors
10. The Obsidian Conspiracy
It's no big secret that I'm a huge fan of Nevermore and a new album from them is always exciting news in my book. I've pretty much always enjoyed everything they've put out and I place them as my favorite band of all time. No small praise there considering the amount of bands I enjoy/listen to. The thing with Nevermore is their style is quite unique and brings together perfectly many elements of metal that I enjoy. From the original metal vocals of Warrel to the incredible guitar of Jeff Loomis comes such a great fusion of darkness, emotion, heaviness, and skillful playing. To me Nevermore is just a beautiful combination of gothic darkness and emotion with the punch of riffs of thrash metal rolling into the fold.
Upon first listening to the new one, The Obsidian Conspiracy, it didn't quite grab me I must say. Not that anything I was listening to was bad, but there were some unusual vocal approaches on songs. One example would be And The Maiden Spoke which seems to not quite sync with the music at times as Warrel tries to match pace with some erratic riffs. Seems more like yelling over the music and this is not my favorite though the song does build to better vocals in the chorus. Another song which features Warrel experimenting a bit with his vocals to mixed success is The Day You Built The Wall which has some oddly distorted vocal deliveries that aren't quite his best. I can see what he was going for on both these tracks, but it doesn't quite come together. There's also not a great deal of immediately catchy tracks, or at least not as many as I usually feel are on a Nevermore album. There certainly are some though as I'd consider Your Morals, Emptiness Unobstructed, Moonrise to be immediately catchy at the least.
All that being said, this is definitely a grower. The Day You Built The Wall for instance has grown on me with the nice creeping feel to the music. And The Maiden Spoke likewise sits better with me after giving myself some time to get used to it. Neither of these are favorites, but I would consider them decent Nevermore cuts.
There are other songs which are more immediately pleasing and really those do tend to be my favorites. These may be slightly more typical Nevermore tracks, but in a way it's what I like about em. Directly catchy, gripping, with good emotive vocals from Warrel. Among these are Without Morals which has a good Nevermore heavy groove reminiscent of something from Dead Heart perhaps. Good heaviness building to an epic and emotional sounding chorus makes for a damn fine song. Also worth mentioning as a more traditional Nevermore song that more immediately hits home are Moonrise which is in a similar vein and Emptiness Unobstructed which is one of those 'semi-soft' sort of Nevermore songs that switches moods from slower moments to an energetic chorus while always letting a little heavier sounding guitar known. Other interesting inclusions are the title track which is a real shredder and The Blue Marble And The New Soul which is a very moving piece of softer music featuring some nice piano. Very beautiful and dark track.
The sum total of this album is while it isn't an immediate hard hitter and there's some experimentation which works to varying degrees of success, it does grow on you once you sort of get used to the album and there are some really good cuts here. This may not be their best album they've ever done, but really... not every album can be. I think this is one of those albums that's destined to be underrated because it may not be as good as say Dead Heart but, in my opinion at least, that's the kind of album that may come once a career and a band cannot be expected to top themselves every time out. I've already read some criticism that this isn't what people had hoped for after 5 years, but really I think that's harsh. Nevermore deliver an album in their patented style with a little experimentation and some good standouts. Good enough to satisfy this fan of the band. Their playing, phenomenal sound, and personality as a band, plus some really satisfying tracks is more than enough to get a 4 out of 5 from me. Not as good as Dead Heart, Godless, or Politics... but way more than listenable and the band still stands near the top of metal for me unquestioned. A pretty solid Nevermore release is still head and shoulders above a lot of bands for me.
Highlights: The Blue Marble And The New Soul, Emptiness Unobstructed, Your Morals, Moonrise
Rating - 4.0/5
2. Your Poison Throne
3. Moonrise
4. And the Maiden Spoke
5. Emptiness Unobstructed
6. The Blue Marble and the New Soul
7. Without Morals
8. The Day You Built the Wall
9. She Comes in Colors
10. The Obsidian Conspiracy
It's no big secret that I'm a huge fan of Nevermore and a new album from them is always exciting news in my book. I've pretty much always enjoyed everything they've put out and I place them as my favorite band of all time. No small praise there considering the amount of bands I enjoy/listen to. The thing with Nevermore is their style is quite unique and brings together perfectly many elements of metal that I enjoy. From the original metal vocals of Warrel to the incredible guitar of Jeff Loomis comes such a great fusion of darkness, emotion, heaviness, and skillful playing. To me Nevermore is just a beautiful combination of gothic darkness and emotion with the punch of riffs of thrash metal rolling into the fold.
Upon first listening to the new one, The Obsidian Conspiracy, it didn't quite grab me I must say. Not that anything I was listening to was bad, but there were some unusual vocal approaches on songs. One example would be And The Maiden Spoke which seems to not quite sync with the music at times as Warrel tries to match pace with some erratic riffs. Seems more like yelling over the music and this is not my favorite though the song does build to better vocals in the chorus. Another song which features Warrel experimenting a bit with his vocals to mixed success is The Day You Built The Wall which has some oddly distorted vocal deliveries that aren't quite his best. I can see what he was going for on both these tracks, but it doesn't quite come together. There's also not a great deal of immediately catchy tracks, or at least not as many as I usually feel are on a Nevermore album. There certainly are some though as I'd consider Your Morals, Emptiness Unobstructed, Moonrise to be immediately catchy at the least.
All that being said, this is definitely a grower. The Day You Built The Wall for instance has grown on me with the nice creeping feel to the music. And The Maiden Spoke likewise sits better with me after giving myself some time to get used to it. Neither of these are favorites, but I would consider them decent Nevermore cuts.
There are other songs which are more immediately pleasing and really those do tend to be my favorites. These may be slightly more typical Nevermore tracks, but in a way it's what I like about em. Directly catchy, gripping, with good emotive vocals from Warrel. Among these are Without Morals which has a good Nevermore heavy groove reminiscent of something from Dead Heart perhaps. Good heaviness building to an epic and emotional sounding chorus makes for a damn fine song. Also worth mentioning as a more traditional Nevermore song that more immediately hits home are Moonrise which is in a similar vein and Emptiness Unobstructed which is one of those 'semi-soft' sort of Nevermore songs that switches moods from slower moments to an energetic chorus while always letting a little heavier sounding guitar known. Other interesting inclusions are the title track which is a real shredder and The Blue Marble And The New Soul which is a very moving piece of softer music featuring some nice piano. Very beautiful and dark track.
The sum total of this album is while it isn't an immediate hard hitter and there's some experimentation which works to varying degrees of success, it does grow on you once you sort of get used to the album and there are some really good cuts here. This may not be their best album they've ever done, but really... not every album can be. I think this is one of those albums that's destined to be underrated because it may not be as good as say Dead Heart but, in my opinion at least, that's the kind of album that may come once a career and a band cannot be expected to top themselves every time out. I've already read some criticism that this isn't what people had hoped for after 5 years, but really I think that's harsh. Nevermore deliver an album in their patented style with a little experimentation and some good standouts. Good enough to satisfy this fan of the band. Their playing, phenomenal sound, and personality as a band, plus some really satisfying tracks is more than enough to get a 4 out of 5 from me. Not as good as Dead Heart, Godless, or Politics... but way more than listenable and the band still stands near the top of metal for me unquestioned. A pretty solid Nevermore release is still head and shoulders above a lot of bands for me.
Highlights: The Blue Marble And The New Soul, Emptiness Unobstructed, Your Morals, Moonrise
Rating - 4.0/5
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