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After 2009’s all-acoustic, yet superb album, Evocation
I: The Arcane Dominion, many fans of the pagan metal
leaders Eluveitie were wondering if the band would return
to the metal of their 2007 Nuclear Blast debut, Slania. On
Everything Remains (As It Never Was) the answer is
an unmistakable YES.
On the new record, The Swiss eight-piece sounds more like
Gothenburg metal than many of today’s bands that evolved
from the original scene. The melodic death metal reminds me
very much of the subgenre’s greats like Dark Tranquillity,
Hypocrisy and At the Gates (take one listen to “Nil”
or “Sempiternal Embers”). But the modernized,
more refined style is most similar to In Flames' albums Reroute
to Remain (think “Drifter,” “Egonomic”)
or Come Clarity (“Take This Life”). And
that’s a good thing for myself, as In Flames is my favorite
band. A lot of this can be credited to producer Colin Richardson,
who’s crisp, precise production can be found on some
of my favorite metal albums (Machine Head’s Burn
My Eyes, Fear Factory’s Demanufacture,
Carcass’ Heartwork). From the heavy riffs,
song structures, memorable melodies and huge choruses, this
is the best Swedish melodic death metal album in recent years
from a band that doesn’t even call Sweden its home.
You could even call a large portion of this brutal.
The band’s founder and vocalist, Chrigel Glanzmann,
death growls with the best of them—Anders Friden of
In Flames, Mikael Stanne of Dark Tranquility—but also
uses an epic singing voice on tracks like “The Essence
of Ashes.”
It doesn’t stop there. Melodic death is only half of
the aspect of Eluveitie. (After all, why would you need eight
members for a melodeath band?) The breakthrough style comes
from the band’s fusion of pagan and folk music played
on traditional Celtic instruments like bagpipes, whistles,
violins, acoustic guitars and the hurdy-gurdy playing of Anna
Murphy. Murphy—who was the main vocalist on Evocation:
The Arcane Dominion—along with Meri Tadic, provide
the female backing vocals (mostly for choruses) on a majority
of the songs here, as well.
With Everything Remains (As It Never Was), we essentially
have one of the strongest Swedish melodeath albums in recent
years and also one of the strongest folk metal albums to date
combined in one hell of a record—every song features
both faces of Eluveitie.
The Eluveitie tribe has done something incredible, releasing
a memorable heavy, heavy album, blanketed in culture and originality.
I have a feeling fans of underground extreme metal may say
the album is too polished and too accessible. The complaints
will stop short of a sell-out due to the death vocals. But
you know, what’s the point in investing your time, hard-earned
money and sweat into something if no one’s going to
hear it? Good question. I have a feeling a lot of metalheads
are going to hear Everything Remains (As It Never Was).
Standout tracks: “Thousandfold,” “Nil,”
“The Essence of Ashes,” “Quoth the Raven.”
®2010 Live-Metal.net
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