Bullet Point Metal Reviews

Concise Summary: The Rose of Lilith is a little-known band from the United States, and Soulless is their second single, their first being from 2015. Soulless is an interesting song from multiple standpoints, the first of which is vocally. With names like Lance King (formerly of Pyramaze), Ralf Scheepers (of Primal Fear), Mikel Johnston (of Heretical Lacerations), and Andi Kravljaca (of Aeon Zen), there are a wide variety of vocal styles on Soulless, all of which are very well-done. However, I think that the vocals should have been separated more. As it is, Mikel Johnston seems to do most of the singing, and when the other three come in, at least two are generally singing in harmony, which drowns out their individual voices. The harmony is OK, but I think it would have been better to have a two-person stereo harmony (instead of being mono like it is). Basically I think that, for example, Lance and Ralf should have done a harmony with Lance balanced left and Ralf balanced rig...

Concise Summary: Shakra is certainly not a new band, but Snakes and Ladders is the first album that I have listened to from them. The first thing that immediately stood out to me was the vocals. They are a bit too whiny for my liking; it sounds like the singer is singing through his nose but also adding compression to his vocals. That ends up making a raspy/whiny sound, kind of like early M. Shadows vocals from Avenged Sevenfold, but not as refined and with a warmer, more full rasp. As I think about it,  the singer from Shakra sounds a bit like the singer from Nocturnal Rites, but more nasally. Aside from that, I really like the instrumentals on this album: it's another cool example of throwback-sounding music with modern recording. I like the old-school approach of just drums, vocals, guitar, and bass without much for any other instruments. Because there aren't an overwhelming number of instruments going at once, no ear fatigue really sets in, and the mixing on th...

Concise Summary: In my opinion, Release the Panic back in 2013 was a style transition album into Of Beauty and Rage, which, in turn, set the tone for Gone. However, I think that Of Beauty and Rage and Gone sound way too similar. Both albums seem to have apocalyptic themes to the lyrics, there's a lot of synth, the drums are electronic, there are really no technical guitar parts, and the singing is generally quiet with a few screams thrown in for some variety. Granted, it's a pretty unique sound, but having Of Beauty and Rage and Gone sound so similar, especially with regard to lyrical themes, is just... boring. In my opinion, each album should tell a different story, but Gone just seems to tell the same story that Of Beauty and Rage told: a vague, apocalyptic, dark, and fairly hopeless story. Because the story is so vague, it's not even like a two-part continuation. Apart from the story (or lack thereof), Gone is probably a better album than Of Beauty and Rage. ...

Concise Summary: The Unguided is a band that has apparently been around for quite awhile, but I just found them today. After listening to their newest album, And The Battle Royale, I think I'll be listening to more of their music in the future! And The Battle Royale has fairly synth-driven songs with both clean and screamed vocals. The style is almost like synth-driven metalcore, which I think is a pretty cool and unique concept. That being said, And The Battle Royale doesn't display much style diversity - most of the album is pretty much only has that metalcore-ish sound. As a result, a lot of the songs sound very similar, making the album seem kind of "flat", if you will; the songs seem to run together. Overall, this is a very good album, and I really enjoyed listening to it, but the style diversity is lacking.  My Rating: 8.5 out of 10 Highlights: Excellent vocals Interesting musical style Enjoyable overall sound and feel to the album...

Concise Summary: Well, wow. I didn't expect this album. I thought this album was going to be a style continuation of Phinehas's previous albums, and that was re-enforced by the three preview songs that were released for Dark Flag. I was pretty wrong. Dark Flag really plays out like a dark, sad story, not just a hardcore metal album like Till The End . From what I've heard, Dark Flag's main theme is about people both past and present living in oppression under totalitarian rule  (like in Nazi Germany, Soviet Russia, North Korea, etc.) , and wow it delivers that theme very powerfully. As usual, the guitars and drums are very good, and on this album,  Sean McCulloch seems like he really  stepped up his game, because his vocals are nothing short of amazing. However, there is not much of a bass mix on the album, which feels really weird. Also, the guitars are ultra-processed (that or Daniel Gailey has some kind of super-human ability to immediately mute string...

Concise Summary: Unified by Sweet & Lynch is one of those albums that isn't that bad, but doesn't at all fall within my taste in music. As such, I didn't care for this album. It's classified as "Hard Rock" on iTunes, but it's barely that.... It almost seems more like "Easy-listening Metal". The guitar is not aggressive at all, and most of Sweet's vocals aren't very intense, so this will definitely appeal to fans of older bands. For those who have listened to  Stryper,   Michael Sweet's main band, you will find that Sweet & Lynch is a lot softer and less intense. Just from listening to a bit of George Lynch's current main band, Lynch Mob, I can say that Sweet & Lynch is much more similar to Lynch Mob than Stryper. As far as the actual album goes, it's not bad. Sweet's vocals are good, as usual, Lynch has some really catchy guitar parts in there, and the overall workmanship on the songs is decent. How...

Concise Summary: Anette Olzon's (formerly of Nightwish) and  Jani Liimatainen's (of Cain's Offering, and formerly Sonata Arctica)  new project, The Dark Element, just released their debut self-titled album, and it's pretty darn good. Anette's vocals are, unsurprisingly, amazing, and the instrumentation on this album is also very good. Even the lyrics are well-done! However, I was surprised by the amount of synth used on this album. At first I was really enjoying the energetic sound, but towards the last third of the album, I started to want a change because it felt that what I was hearing had already been done earlier on the album . I mean, individually, the songs are very good, but as an album, variety seems a bit lacking. The slow(ish) songs on the album, "Heaven of Your Heart" and "Someone You Used to Know", and "Only One Who Knows Me" do change things up a bit, but a lot of the other songs on the album really could have ...

Concise Summary: Well, if you've read any of my reviews on this blog before, you know that I value technical songwriting and originality. It probably comes as no surprise, then, that Elvenking's new album titled Secrets of the Magick Grimoire ranks pretty high in my book. The instrumental diversity and style diversity alone on this album is insane! In one song, you'll feel like you're at a Metallica concert, then listening to a cinematic movie soundtrack, and then attending a folk dance! Also, I'm almost positive that all of the instruments and choruses are real and not software instruments, which makes this album that much more impressive. Apart from the instrumentals, the vocals are also quite good. I was a little surprised that there were screamed vocals (I haven't really listened to Elvenking before this album), but they actually work in very well. The mix on this album is quite good. I was losing faith in AFM records after both Orden Ogan's n...

Concise Summary: Sleeping Romance is a relatively new symphonic metal band from Italy, and Alba is their second full-length album. Alba follows a similar pattern to most Italian symphonic/power metal; a lot of instrumentation on each track, clean female singing, and very impressive guitar/drum/bass work. Overall, I thought the album was pretty good. My one main complaint is that the singing seemed pretty dead. There didn't seem to be much sparkle in Federica Lanna's vocals; it sounded like she was just hitting the notes to hit the notes - there wasn't much emotion behind the vocals. That isn't to say Federica isn't a good vocalist, because she is. I just thought that she could have "owned" the vocals more instead of just hitting the right notes. On the other hand, I think that type of singing could be a style, and I will admit I haven't heard that much before; kudos to the band if that's what they were going for. However, it does get kin...

Concise Summary: Well, here's another band that I haven't listened to very much. I've heard of Like Moths to Flames, but haven't explored their music very much. As such, I can't really say if this album is better, worse, or the same as their previous albums. However, what I can say is that I was pretty indifferent to Dark Divine. The first thing that really stood out to me is how little bass is in the mix on the album. I'm not sure if that's the new sound for metalcore, because Phinehas seems to be doing a similar mix on their new album Dark Flag (which I'm definitely going to review on this site). That mix sounded really weird at first, but I got used to it after awhile, and I would say it's definitely not a bad sound. As for the actual music on Dark Divine, I would say I was unimpressed. It definitely wasn't bad, and there are a few spots where it's really good, but I was left feeling like I just ate a piece of bread with nothi...

Concise Summary: WOW!!! This might just be not only the best debut album of the year, but also the album of the year, and I'm not just saying that. Berserker by Beast in Black is so dang good I'm surprised my ceiling doesn't have a hole in it after I listened to the album for the first time! Every single song on this album is just straight up GLORIOUS! There isn't a single one that I disliked. Also, the vocals on this album.... I'm legitimately blown away. The first time I heard  Yannis Papadopoulos sing I was watching Beast in Black's first music video (at least first to my knowledge), Blind and Frozen . When the video cut to Yannis singing, I actually thought he was lip-syncing a woman, but then he started in with the high-compression vocals and I realized his voice is just that diverse! I actually can't believe how good of a vocalist he is - probably top 10 vocalists of all time in my book, maybe top 5. Along with the incredible vocals on th...