All the Beauty...

To be frank the only other review for this album at the time of writing is what prevented me from starting here and made me instead skip to I Have Lost. No, their debut isn't as good as subsequent albums, but it holds its own as part of possibly the best trilogy of albums I've ever heard. All the Beauty shows signs of the band that Mortal Love would grow to become, but there are some signs that this is an inexperienced band and that they've still got things to learn.

We'll start with vocalist Cat, who is absolutely incredible. She's got a very distinct tone to her voice and personally I think she's one of the most original and one of the best in the genre of gothic metal. Right from track one she steals the show, and she really makes the band what it is. On this album she's not quite as hypnotic or charismatic as on the two that followed, but even so her talent is obvious and her performance is convincing throughout. It's a shame that she rarely shows off the higher notes that she can hit though, as that is a particular strength of hers.

The guitars are tuned quite low and tend not to do too much other than thunder along in the background. The riffs they play aren't overly captivating and certainly aren't complex, serving merely as a kind of base for everything else. In that respect it's probably lacking something that the band would find on later material; some kind of melody coming from the guitars, no matter how simple. The only track that it really forces the listener to pay attention to it is on 'Hate to Feel', where the keyboard is relegated to the back as melodic leads from the guitar take charge of the band. The rest of the time it's just kind of there, and it has less of an effect than I'd expected it would have.

Perhaps it is because of this that the keyboard becomes so important to the band here. Mortal Love has always been fairly dependent on their keyboardist, but the entirety of All the Beauty really hangs in the balance of whether or not the keyboard can do anything interesting. It varies a lot from track to track whether this is achieved or not, and many different styles appear to come into play throughout. Mostly though they don't quite demand the listener's attention enough, and although they're reasonably prominent they just don't have the oomph that the band really requires. It doesn't exactly help that they have a habit of doing stuff that doesn't quite work with the guitars.

If you care about the lyrics then I hate to tell you that you're looking into the wrong band. Mortal Love's lyrics are never great, and it's no surprise that they're pretty rubbish here too. If you're like me however then you won't care what Cat's singing about, as her voice is so enchanting that it simply doesn't matter. The mood is generally negative across All the Beauty, again a common theme of Mortal Love's music, and it works well as an atmosphere. However there is something that's slightly off about it which isn't the case with the albums that followed this one, and it probably due to the guitar and keyboard not getting along.

Overall I would say that this is far from being atrocious or even mediocre, it is without a doubt a good debut and showcases a lot of the potential that Mortal Love have. There are some things that just don't quite work entirely as they should though, and ultimately it is very obvious that this is the weakest link in a strong discography. It's definitely worth having a listen to if this band if of interest to you, but both I Have Lost and Forever Will Be Gone are vastly superior to this and they show that the band grew a huge amount in the four years between their debut and finale. Ultimately I would recommend either of those albums over this one.