| Reviews for Clad in Darkness's Amidst Her Shadows |
| Admist her Shadows - 95% |
| Written by hole_in_your_chest
on October 11th, 2008
|
| Let me start this off by saying that I am not a fan of either black metal in general. That being said, this is one of the most powerful pieces I've heard, and I hope they make much, much more. This band plays a combo of black and melodic metal. The black is easily identified by the trademarked sound. Fast drums, tremolo riffs, and shrieked vocals are all done well, if not spectacularly. The parts that really make this album are the melodic bits. These remind me of those acoustic intros and interludes that litter the thrash scene. The real difference is that those intros are used for building suspense or excitement, or to bring a song down from its climax. Here the are used as the suspense, the climax, the excitement, and they are done well! The funny thing is that the black metal is rendered so weak in comparison that it is seemingly reduced to intros and interludes. Forgive the track by track analysis, but: “Foreword” is a bit of a misnomer here as there is no preamble. Straight off, we plunge into the coldest hell of the Norway. A strong scream and some serious black metal paint the early picture, but as a welcome surprise, there are hints of melody already. The big change comes around 1:45 when the first acoustic spotlight is shown. From there the track trades between black and those special guitar performances every 45 seconds or so. Spectacular and gracefully done. “Reveries and Silence” I almost mistook this track as an instrumental, and it’s has enough depth and variety to pass for one. Really has to be heard, but with a diverse style of guitar, and a full-blown drum and bass solo, it well worth the listen. Tied with the closing track for my personal favorite. “Anamnesis” is a short and to the point piece. Think of it like a metal sandwich with black bread, melodic spotlight as the meat, and a peculiar little thrashy riff as the topping. The special little riff really takes what might be seen as a throwaway track and makes the song superb and unforgettable. An example of these guy’s songwriting prowess. “Amidst Her” This track stands out as the one where the vocals are most decipherable. They continue to be harsh, but with enough variance to showcase the vocalist. It also bears saying that this album’s relative shortness might actually help this mini-album as a whole, for it was part way through this track that the first urges of boredom struck. That is certainly not a strike against this song, just a note on my poor attention span. Just one more reason that you should pick up this EP. In closing, if anyone reading this has a record label, I have to ask you to sign this band immediately. For anyone else, just give this a listen. It will be well worth your time. |
| Opeth Styled Black Metal?!!!! - 98% |
| Written by Unholy_Crusader
on February 8th, 2007
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| Initial Impression: If someone had came up to me two weeks ago and told me this idea I would have laughed in their face. I never thought you could get two obviously combustible elements to work together, but I would have been W-R-O-N-G! Clad in Darkness is...yes...a band which combines elements of Black Metal with Opeth styled acoustic segments and riffing. The Release: This is a truly impressive release by a band that shows serious promise in metal. This is also the first overly positive review I've given on metal-archives.com! Raise your heads up high gentlemen, I'm not an easy listener to please, just read my other reviews. As much as I would love to just let go and give this album the 100% and clarify it as hands down the best EP I have ever heard I must try to be unbiased here. BM elitists/purists will HATE this album, as will fans of Death Metal and Thrash. This is actually an album which really will appeal to fans of Opeth, and other bands of that nature. No the unfortunate thing here is that sometimes the band sounds a little to much like Opeth, which isn't a real problem for me but I could see how some people would find it annoying, hence I detracted two points for the sake of professionalism. The release itself is very dark and sorrowful, something Opeth doesn't always do right but this band seems to have done a pretty damn good job for having only two releases under their belts. They must have some extremely talented musicians. The band has also taken away an extremely annoying aspect of Opeth out of the equation, alot of times Opeth tends to draw things on for too long. Certain segments of Opeth songs can get too repetitive and cheesy, something Clad in Darkness manages to avoid. The songs aren't as overly long as Opeth, some songs have some length to them but they manage to keep it from getting ridiculous, the songs manage to remain fresh and new as you listen to them, adding to the releases repeatability. Vocals: The Vocals switch from harsh, sorrowful Black Metal vocals to melodic and strangely inhuman sounding clean vocals which add to the overall dark and sad feeling of the release. The vocals only help to draw you into the art and in a split second rip you apart in harsh Black Metal segments. Guitars: The guitar is pretty damn good. Not your typical minimalist approach but they keep it relatively simple. There are alot of aggressive BM/Opeth styled distorted parts which usually have a more melodic guitar line being played over the other more crushing guitar line. The melodic guitar line again, serves to draw in a darker atmosphere. The acoustic parts are brilliantly written and help set the tone of the particular song and are kept simple and melodic. There are even more 70's styled guitar solos played using an undistorted clean electric guitar. Bass: Unfortunately this can be a little hard to pick up sometimes. But from what I have heard there are definitely some good bass lines to be found here as well. Drums: The drum work is damn very impressive. The drumming will definitely remind you of Opeth. The big difference here is that the band has a larger focus on blast-beats and double bass work on the heavier parts. Lyrics; I've had a big problem in the past with bands trying to be poetic. But they do manage to pull it off! The lyrics are very poetic and well written; the lyrics fit the dark atmosphere of the album well. Production: Very well produced for an unsigned band! No one instrument drowns out the other and the vocals fit in well with the rest of the band. Poor production had become a personal enemy of mine in recent years. Not just Black Metal's raw production style, but the inability to listen to certain parts of the release due to horrible production drowning it out. Overall: I would love to sit here and state many more positive things about this band, but I prefer to keep it simple and to the point. All-in-all, this is an EP I would highly recommend everyone to listen to and at least give a chance. I'm definitely going to order this EP off their website and try to get my hands on the other one as well. Final Score: 98 |
| Great album from a very promising band - 96% |
| Written by SRX
on January 21st, 2007
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| A newer Black Metal band from Chicago, Clad in Darkness has pulled the black metal genre and remade it in a more melodic, sorrowful, and overall more inspiring set of music that gives the genre a new feel. I have not had the opportunity to listen to their previous EP, but this new one is definitely a winner. They use a mix of somewhat raw black metal sound and an almost acoustic guitar use, though it is more of a 70's psychedelic feel to it. The drumming is excellent, good use of double base, toms, and crashes in the more intense parts, and a fitting choice of softly hitting the hi hat and snare in the less intense parts. The base guitar is, unfortunately, hard to pick up specifically and is more of a soft guide to push the song forward. The vocals is strong and is a fine example of black metal growls and fine clean vocals here and there. The difference however from other clean vocals is that here, it sounds less human than the black metal growls. The clean vocals really pick from the imagination and makes it feel more abstract. The overall sound quality is excellent for a self made album. Then again, this is the new century, it isn't hard to make a good sounding album. But nevertheless, Clad in Darkness has spent a good amount of effort on the sound quality and it is great. 1. Foreword This first track starts with a harsh cry and a full-out charge of fast drumming and distorted guitar picking. It pushes down to a general sounding black metal song, the vocalist doing his thing along side and interesting lead on the guitar until about 1:42 where it slows to a mellow acoustic passage. Very serene, until it builds straight back up to another intense part like at the beginning. Then at 3:00, it goes into another softer acoustic passage. This time, clean vocals come in. The use of crash in this part creates a soft level of driving that tells you that there is still more energy left in this song. There definitely is; it flies back up a few notches and pulls a full ensamble to this last part of the song. One of the guitarists adds this high note lead above the rest of the band that sets an atmospheric tone to it that tries to pull the intensity of this part even higher. At the last "We will walk together again", the song stops with a strong feel that they got they simply message across. A very powerful song and a great way to start off this EP. 2. Revelries & Silence A much mellower (and longer) song than the first one. The song starts with fade in to an acoustic lead that strives on until about 1:05 which they pull out the distortion and blasts away. Note that that the tempo doesn't change. There is intensity but at the same pace. This part is pretty quick and dies down fast to another acoustic part. Then comes in the 70's sounding psychedelic solo, some call it wankery, I call it excellent. It has more emotion to it than mindless wankery. This lasts till about 3.40 where another raw sounding part comes in and the vocalist does his piece. Excellent use of double base. Afterwards comes one of the best riffs I have ever heard, an extremely sorrowful riff that adds and edge to this part. Dies down to a acoustic outro that concludes in a fade out. 3. Anamnesis Another intense one. You get to hear the singer's black metal vocals get to work, and done right. There isn't too much to say about this track, its very similar to Foreward but it has one main acoustic passage in the middle instead of a mix but it does throw itself to an intense ending, like in Foreword. It is a good song overall, just very similar sounding to the first track and ends pretty fast. 4. Amist Her Shadows This is the last song and is another softer song. The song has an superb acoustic start to a strong distorted power chord strum. Then comes a nice set of clean vocals here singing the intro part of the lyrics. One the better songs I have heard when it comes to emotion. It picks up speed and goes into a fast part. The vocalist is more pronounciated in his words here, a great example of control in a person's vocals. You can hear the bassist more and it sounds great. The drumming, still great. The drummer knows when to use each drum type when and doesn't mindlessly just pound on the base kit whenever. They eventually change to clean vocals while still keeping the fast pace. Around 3:30, it slows and goes into a acoustic then clean distortion guitar passage, along with more clean vocal parts. The vocals turn back to black metal vocals, as it starts a build up. Faster and faster until the band just explodes into a frenzy. A final shriek and and final strum, leaving the distortion to die down finishes the album. Overall this is an amazing album, these guys know what they are doing and have so much potential. Its a wonder how they haven't been signed yet. They certainly are taking a path that pushes boundaries when it comes to music and take their work to a professional level. Some old school Black Metal fans might not dig this at first but you should give it a chance. |