Saviour Machine II

The first S.V. album has been rated 100 twice and although this is as well an exceptional album it pales in some aspects with the debut. Saviour Machine II is for me the last good S.V. album for many reasons.

First and foremost this is one damn good album. It really sounds apart from the gothic pack of bands back then and it also creates an atmosphere that they never accomplished before. The focused entirely on creating kind of a gothic opera with a lot of movements and a buildup which starts with ‘Saviour Machine’ and ends with ‘Saviour Machine II’ trying to tie the entire concept and most important, the ethereal sound on the majority of the songs, plus the melancholic vibe of the ballads. This not a simple album structure like before where you had song by song going on. In here they are all tied to give a magnificent continuity of both the music and the concept.

Gone are the fast and metallic sounds from the previous effort (i.e. Force of the Entity) and they incorporated industrial elements. This is to me what takes points from the album since lots of bands have done this with bad results. This band does not appeal to me using these elements either (The Hunger Circle). The ballads in this case have more of a melancholic feeling and they are certainly more atmospheric. They are as well, lyrically, even more philosophical but introspective as well, which give them a very intelligent thought-provoking vibe.

They keyboards have taken a predominant role and the ballads are driven by them (Child in Silence & Love never dies). The drums have lost the metallic edge, and they are now more industrial-electronic rhythm based so this is definitely a different album. The guitar distortion remains more and less equal and they definitely worked on the melodies to make them even more appealing. Nevertheless, due to the lost of punch, the use of rhythm guitars is now very back-grounded. Another aspect they sacrificed is catchiness. Where the first album have melodies that would stick to your mind in here it is really hard to actually pick up a song you can remember, perhaps ‘Ascension of Heroes’ and ‘Love never dies’ have this catchiness so to say but basically the rest of the album, due to the continuity of the concept and movement of the opera. The song writing is even more complex and deep. This time we have elaborated lyrical concepts and thus, elaborated compositions to clearly give emphasis to transmitting the message.

The length of the songs has been extended as well so we now have even a 16min. song, an almost 9min. song and two reaching the 7min. mark. If it weren’t because there are no separations between the songs but there are many styles mixed you could think you are listening to the same song.

This is definitely a more complex and darker album compared to the debut, and very good indeed, but the sacrifice of the metal side does not appeal to me as much, but if you want pure and unadulterated gothic opera and awesome lyrical concepts you can pick this one up without fear. Saviour Machine still holds a top place in my music collection