(CD, Century Media, 2011)
During the last 5 years I have been writing reviews and live reports for all these bands out there, I’ve been eager to grab the opportunity and express my worst opinion about the Finnish melo-death metallers CHILDREN OF BODOM by saying how terrible singer Laiho and how boring COB’s sound is and I still cannot understand where the huge success of this band has come from. But all these since today that the new NORTHER album fell into my hands and I’m so happy that finally the imitator/pupil is way better than the original/teacher, rubbing in COB’s nose this awesome result.
Now that I cleared my conscience by saying all the above, I would like to introduce you the new NORTHER, after the departure of Petri Lindroos who wanted to focus on ENSIFERUM, choosing such a different music path. Aleksi Sihvonen was his direct replacement on vocals and Daniel Freyberg on guitars, giving a different character in NORTHER of 2011. I am going to explain myself later though about that.
“Circle Regenerated” is the title of the sixth full length NORTHER album and the sound is obviously more mature, having such solid compositions than the previous “N” and “Till Death Unites Us” of the past. The opening “Throught It All” carries a mind-blowing, catchy riff melody with the keyboards being unperturbed in the background, creating the best atmospheric/cold eastern scene for Aleksi’s aggressive vocals who sings his lungs out. The guitarist duo Ranta/ Freyberg does an excellent job spitting unstoppable and competitive riffs, passing the baton in the same successful way to the rest of the album. Tracks like “The Hate I Bear” (what a hook-y riff!), “Truth”, “Falling” (so CREMATORY-esque change between clean vocals and keyboards) and “We Do Not Care” put the mark in the modern Scandinavian melo-Death sound, looking straight in the eyes bands like KALMAH and CHILDREN OF BODOM of course who should take a note from them on how the non-boring music is created.
As a result of all the above, “Circle Regenerated” remains an easy-listening album and that’s why many bitchy followers of Petri’s works will hurry up to put on it the ‘commercial’ label, adding that NORTHER are dead since Petri left. I still don’t understand why an album is bad when it sells. I really don’t get it. I don’t think that NORTHER came up to the Scandinavian Metal scene to grab the kingship chair of bands like AMORPHIS, IN FLAMES or INSOMNIUM and that’s because they do something different, simply putting their personal stone in the Gothenburg/ melo-death modern building. If that’s bad for you, ignore them. I will continue to listen to “Circle Regenerated” till the next NORTHER album, trying to forget that bands like CHILDREN OF BODOM are still out there, selling so many albums, especially in the other side of the Atlantic Ocean without being ‘commercial’.
7/10
Links:
www.Norther.Net
www.MySpace.Com/Norther
www.FaceBook.Com/NortherBand
Tracklist:
01. Through It All
02. The Hate I Bear
03. Truth
04. Some Day
05. Break Myself Away
06. Believe
07. Falling
08. We Do Not Care
09. The Last Time
10. Closing In
Lineup:
Kristian Ranta - Guitars, Clean Vocals
Aleksi Sihvonen - Vocals
Heikki Saari - Drums
Jukka Koskinen - Bass
Tuomas Planman - Keyboards
Daniel Freyberg - Guitars