Before The Dawn
Deathstar Rising
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Tracklist:
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01. The First Snow
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1:20
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02. Winter Within
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4:32
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03. Deathstar
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3:31
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04. Remembrance
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3:38
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05. Unbroken
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4:39
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06. Judgement
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4:20
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07. The Wake
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5:07
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08. Sanctuary
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4:52
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09. Butterfly Effect
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3:53
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10. Wreith
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5:16
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Release: 25.02.2011
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Label: Nuclear Blast
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Format: Jewelcase-CD
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The Finnish band Before The Dawn was founded in 1999 so they're known for quite a while now. The band's sixth CD Deathstar Rising was released on February 25, 2011, through Nuclear Blast. Their music is labeled as something you can nowadays find among the newer metal genres - I tag it with "I like it" ;-)
These four guys are musically top-notch. They rock all-out; intensely, hard and heavy. The guitarists Juho Räihä and Tuomas Saukkonen let it rip, bassist Lars Eikind and drummer Atte Palokangas push the songs forward, the music blares out of the boxes at the highest stage - but at the same time the album starts completely different with The First Snow, with enchanting calm acoustic guitars for 1:20 instrumental minutes. On it goes with Winter Within. The Finns and the long cold winter... you can find it in song titles as well as in the lyrics. Other slower, softer parts in songs like e.g. Sanctuary and The Wake can positively surprise the listener. The music might be hard but I can really enjoy it 'cause these are excellent musicians and the melodies are very complex.
Guitarist Tuomas Saukkonen and Lars Eikind share the vocal parts. Tuomas is responsible for the "dark vocals" (read: singing / grunting with a deep, rough-edged, throaty voice), Lars for the "clean vocals" (read: just straight and normal, as you know it). I usually don't like "dark vocals" but Before The Dawn is one of the few bands that makes me like them. Tuomas sounds animalistic, very hard, but in a way that I'm able to understand the lyrics... most of the time. I like Lars' voice, but he should sing more parts, imho.
My suggestions are:
Winter Within – pure power, a great refrain and amazing guitar parts, very catchy!
Judgement – Lars has a bigger part here 'cause he's singing the verses - sometimes in two voices, great! I really like the drums, too...
Deathstar Rising – perfectly blares out of the speakers. Lars gets some support while singing the refrain, which sound gorgeous.
Some points of criticism:
Most of the songs are rather similar to each other: Tuomas sings the verses, Lars the refrains and only two songs have a different composition. Various arrangements would've been nice. If I ignore the pretty short First Snow track I still have nine songs left (all with a regular duration) which is not enough for me. Two fragments at the beginning of Wraith make me pretty nervous and the entry of the choir is sort of disturbing. I just can't cope with this song, perhaps it's too complex for my ears ;-) There's another thing: I understand the most, but not all of Tuomas' lyrics... unfortunately.
Rating:
5 out of 7 Ankhs
Marion Ney / Sarkophag Rocks 04.05.2011
Translation by Susanne Blum
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