Gothenburg's prog metal legends EVERGREY will release their 14th studio album, "Theories of Emptiness" on June 7th 2024 through Napalm. Crazy to think they have made this many albums - a sizable chunk have been forgettable but the recent batch has seen them sounding rather revitalized.



track listing:

1. Falling from the Sun
2. Misfortune
3. To Become Someone Else
4. Say
5. Ghost of My Hero
6. We Are the North
7. One Heart
8. The Night Within
9. Cold Dreams
10. Our Way Through Silence
11. A Theory of Emptiness

The very stock, very serviceable, very forgettable and by-the-numbers first single isn't making this an album to anticipate for me but some might feel differently so here's the video;



What has got me excited is the announcement of a special guest;

The last album was my intro to the band and I thought it was pretty good. Englund sounded great on that last Redemption album also.

Their run since Hymns for the Broken has been awesome, even if perhaps getting away from some of their more prog tendencies. I’m pretty excited about anything they do these days.

This. Their run since “Hymns” has been remarkable.

In 2003 I would have argued they were one of the best Prog/Power metal bands. Solitude, In Search of Truth and Recreation Day was a great run and I listened to those albums alot. Crazy to think that was over 20 years ago.

Maybe it's just me but they lost me with Inner Circle. I've tried countless times to listen to the albums after that, but it never hit like Recreation Day. This first single doesn't have me too excited. To be fair though, I haven't listened to their last two albums they put out.

Those guys (and Soilwork) are like the anti-Dark Tranquillity; they're always releasing stuff at a steady rate. I remember an interview Tom did with Ola Englund in which he stated that he treats the act of writing music much like novelists do: You've got to do it every day, and for every five-ish dumb riffs/hooks/ideas, an exceptional one will come out and the "bad" ones get reworked ad infinitum, so they never run out of material.

That first single is a bit too simplistic in terms of structure, but the chorus and main riff are solid. The cover artwork is great, too. It's different from what they've been doing since Hymns.

New song. It's sounding amazing.

Okay, that one just fucking rocks.

Shame about Jonas leaving though, he was a huge part of the band's style. Hopefully whoever replaces him will be up to the task.

The song featuring Jonas Renkse dropped. It's typical Evergrey fare but I like that they do the dual vocals together, even if Englund and Renkse sound indistinguishable until the latter digs deep to eke out some mean growls. I liked it overall.

Jeez, that might be one of their best songs in a decade. And hearing Jonas do growls is great, he sounds pretty awesome considering how long it's been since he's done any.

Great album so far. Just getting through my first listen. It's very atmospheric and well produced. They sound good when they have such a roomy big sound.

I gave it a listen this morning and I have some pretty mixed thoughts.

Overall the production is great - the mix is absolutely huge, great layering everywhere, just top-tier. That's been true of the last few albums from Evergrey but it's really great to continue here. The guitar work is also stellar. Evergrey always struck me as really under-appreciated when it comes to riff and solo writing, and they have some extremely good ones here with tons of little variations and interesting creative choices. The shreddier moments are almost mesmerizing in their speed and technicality too.

As far as songwriting goes, there are some awesome tracks that rock really hard. Falling From the Sun, Say, We Are the North, and One Heart are all standouts. I mentioned loving Cold Dreams, too, which I still feel is one of their best songs in almost a decade.

But the album also feels like it has some tracks that needed more work. Misfortune, To Become Someone Else, and Ghost of My Hero in particular come across as almost half-finished ideas. On those I was sitting there just waiting for them to wrap it up and hoping the next song would be better, which I don't think I've ever had happen with Evergrey before. I would have really appreciated a faster track or two as well. On the last few albums we had songs like Blindfolded, Escape of the Phoenix, Leaden Saints, My Allied Ocean, etc. and there isn't anything quite as energetic this time around.

Lyrics and themes aren't the most important for me, but it's also hard to not feel like they're a bit... rushed-feeling here? For something called "Theories of Emptiness" I don't get much of a sense there is an underlying idea to the album, or anything that matches the solemn, isolated feel of the cover art. I miss proggy Evergrey, where the albums had more of a unifying idea or story.

This is still a solid album, and there are some real bangers, but it's still the most disappointing they've done in a long while. The last couple releases already had a bit of a quantity over quality feel, and Theories of Emptiness is kinda like "oh, you want another album already? kay, here's what we've got". But who knows, maybe I'll warm up to it.

As someone who didn't like the album before, this one is knocking it out of the park for me. I don't like the first two tracks but track 3 onwards is all pretty solid and memorable. The Atlantic and this one will probably end up as my personal best from this current era.

Agreed on “The Atlantic”. Their masterpiece, imo.