The Children of the Night

Tribulation is a band that’s been going for 20 years now. Of those two decades, they can easily be split into two eras: the death metal era and the gothic metal era. I hold the first two Tribulation albums close to my heart as stone-cold death metal classics, but those aren’t the subject of today’s review. Instead, I’m focusing on the start of the second era for Tribulation, as “Children of the Night” represented a massive change in Tribulation’s sound. While I still wish there was another death metal follow-up to “The Formulas of Death,” “Children of the Night” knocks it out of the park.

This album is much less heavy than its predecessors. Gone are chunkier guitar passages, and in their place comes the sinewy, reverb-soaked swirling guitars of Tribulation’s gothic era. Keyboards pop up periodically but aren’t a fixture of the sound. This album is heavily carried by the guitars, and they have a constant feel of pushing forward. I don’t know what the band had in mind exactly throughout the writing of this album, but every riff leaps out at the listener and fluidly leads to the next, until the song ends. This process is repeated throughout the runtime of the album and makes it hard to listen to it on a song-by-song basis. I am also a full-album listener, so I usually don’t pay attention to individual songs as much as I do complete albums. Even the lead guitar parts will typically fit into the rhythm parts, making them less of a “solo” and more of an additional melodic accompaniment to the main riffs. This approach can be best summed up on “Melancholia,” “The Motherhood of God,” and “In the Dreams of the Dead.”

The drums on this album are not doing anything particularly mind blowing but they are in lockstep with the guitars in a way that adds to the propulsive feel that these songs all share. “Winds” has a breakdown around 5 minutes in where the guitars drop back and let the drums push the song forward, as well as featuring some neat keyboards. Everything about this album just works together and shows a band firing on all cylinders. The vocals are again, not doing anything particularly mind blowing, but the tone of Mr. Andersson’s growls is perfect for this gothic sound. I hope the band doesn’t abandon these growls as they move towards using clean vocals with their upcoming release, as they just mix in with the music marvellously.

A lot of the heaviness of the death metal era of Tribulation is gone here, but that’s not a bad thing when the songs are this good. The instrumental “Sjalaflykt” feels like it incorporates a bit of the heavier parts of the bands sound into the new gothic approach in a neat way but is one of the few examples of that older death metal approach present on this release. Don’t go into this album expecting it to cave your skull in with heaviness like “For Victory.”

Tribulation knows how to write songs with bombast, something they’d do further on “Where the Gloom Becomes Sound” 5 years later, but “Children of the Night” set the precedent for the band moving forward. This album has since become a template for Tribulation, as the two albums that followed acted more as iterations than revolutions on this template, but when the template is this good, can you blame them? There’s a whole lot of juice to squeeze from this “Formula of Death.” Each chorus on this album clearly establishes itself as such and the band’s songwriting sensibilities (in terms of writing earworms) are apparent. Most songs on this album are in the 5-6 range barring the interlude “Cauda Pavonis” and the opener, but they manage to make lengthy songs feel short. My CD pressing has two bonus tracks “Laudanum Dreams” and “One Hundred Years” (a cover of a great The Cure song). With these bonus tracks included, it pads the runtime of this album to a whopping 68 minutes. That’s two whole “From Enslavement to Obliteration’s” with 10 minutes to spare. They mostly manage to make this album fly by like a much shorter album.

I’m not giving this album a perfect 100% score as it does deserve some criticism. I wish the bass was more prominent, as songs like “Winds” let the bass shine through for a moment before retreating into the soundscape. The bass tone has a nice growl and sounds less ethereal than the guitars. As well, I think the uniformity of the songs on this album is great for full album listening, but consequently, it can sometimes be difficult to establish precisely what song is what at a quick listen. I mentioned that the choruses are immediately apparent in the songs, but this differentiates the choruses from the rest of the song structure, not from the surrounding songs. I don’t see this as a bad thing when evaluating “Children of the Night” as a full album, but I know in the era of streaming that songs have taken precedence over albums.

As a quick aside, the cover art for this album is a perfect encapsulation of what the band was going for. It’s a mix of gothic atmosphere, grace and elegance, just like any good vampire should be. I wish more bands were open to using stills from early 1900s films for art, as it’s something that stands out from the crowd. As much as I love them, a bit less Lewandowski and Thomas Cole might be good for the metal scene’s visual language.

To summarize, “Children of the Night” was a risky step for Tribulation that paid off. Oftentimes when a band known for heavier material decides to “soften” their sound, whether for commercial gain or change in direction, it flops horrifically (look at Ketzer trying to become Tribulation). Sometimes though, a band genuinely feels like they want to go in a different direction for reasons other than the almighty dollar. Along their Scandinavian compatriots Amorphis and Tiamat, they managed to do what “Elegy” and “Wildhoney” did a few decades earlier. If you haven’t, give “Children of the Night” a listen, and don’t skip the next two albums, as Tribulation’s quality didn’t drop.

A follow up album will always be measured by the standards set on the previous one that is a fact, high expectations can kill an album release, marketing involved, the release date, the promotion, etc.

Tribulation set new standards in death metal with their highly acclaimed “The Formulas Of Death” and right after its release all the fans and critics alike popped the question, what would they do to make a better record ?. After 30 spins I am writing this review.

“The Children Of The Night” is not your average record coming from a band trying to reinvent the wheel, as it wasn't crafted about experimentation and progression. Lots of people (including me) might think this 3rd full length was going to be a hard listen, going deeper into the depths of what the band created with “The Formulas Of Death” and might polish the trademark sound created with it. Well… guess what? That is not happening here.

As the album begins it’s almost impossible not to compare the intro to what Ghost (Ghost BC) have done in the past, with a Hammond organ giving the creepy atmosphere for the entire record. Then the starting riff of the second track begins and the whole picture is unveiled, my hope for a total metal album was gone, I knew right there that this was going to be a rock album with an obscure traditional heavy metal approach. The guitars sound like classic Jimmy Page overdrive sound with a bit more bottom end reminiscent to NWOBHM distortion, the drums are as rock basic as possible, no fast parts, no double bass drum kick and a 70s, 80s edge to it, specially the snare and cymbals. Bass guitar is pretty much audible every moment which gives a sense of clarity and open sound to the record.

Now the most critical side of “The Children of the Night” apart from what was mentioned before, are 3 things: Songwriting, Structures, Keyboards. The songwriting approach is weird, parting from 2-3 main riffs per song and just play around those to finish the song. The structures were also affected, going from intro, verse, chorus, verse, bridge and end, to an even more basic structure in a couple of songs. And now the risky dice played in this record, the keyboards (to me) make this record lose its focus on the main idea, as it gives more filler time than flow over the songs, abusing of its sound was not the right idea on my perspective as instead of making the band sound mature, it could made the band sound a bit pretentious. After listening to the first 2 songs I pretty much knew 90% of how the record will end up sounding in general as they keep the same mood and vibe through the entire album.

But not everything is bad about “The Children Of The Night”, actually I can say this is a very enjoyable, fun and easy listening record, you don’t need to pay lots of attention to what is going on, you just put the record in the player and let the flow takes you to a mix of 70s, 80s and 90s rock with heavy metal and even some post rock and post punk sounds, this is the kind of record you can listen every time, every day and won’t put you to think much about if it’s good or not, just make you play the air guitar like trying to mimic Pete Townshend, Jimmy Page and the early guitar gods. If it wasn’t for Johannes Andersson vocal delivery this album could have been aimed to a different market.

The artwork is magnificent, but not original (again), as it’s some sort of inverted copy of the cover from a classic horror movie of 1915, however it displays the music contained pretty well, the layout is awesome, very dark and classy. The length of the album might be a problem for some people wanting to listen to a 30-40 minutes album, as it clocks over 55 minutes for the regular edition and over 60 minutes in the special editions making it an album hard to listen completely again after you listen to it a few times and maybe just selecting your favorite songs for the casual listen session.

I must say that even when this album is an easy ride record, it’s a joyful ride and bring back feelings that other bands don’t deliver anymore, I went ahead and revisited some Led Zeppelin, Rush, Deep Purple and Black Sabbath records, and now I think of them as timeless pieces of art due to their catchy and easy approach, and I think Tribulation aimed for it and succeeded, creating a timeless record were rock meets early metal, no matter if you like Iron Maiden, AC/DC or Van Halen everyone is invited to rock the hell out of it and have a good time.
Old school death metal fans will criticize the path Tribulation took this time, and will probably say they sellout by signing to a bigger label and putting out an album like this, however this is not about evolution, sometimes we just need simple stuff to make us remember where we come from, how do we end up listening to rock music and why we love it so much.

Is “The Children of the Night” a contender to album of the year? Well my friends, I must say it will sure make it into tons of end of the year lists, and I will feel very disappointed about the entire human race if not. If there is an album you need to buy this year, I would say go grab this one.

I am still of the mind that The Horror is the greatest thing Sweden's Tribulation has yet recorded, but that's not to say I'm any less intrigued when there's the announcement that they're releasing anything new. Yes, their explosive, rabid death/thrash origins have yet to be eclipsed by their experimentation, and the sort of constant reinvention they pursue is likely to earn the ire of many a purist; but The Formulas of Death was certainly an excellent departure into a murky swath of prog/death territory which hadn't been explored with quite the same sound. The album I'll turn to when I wish to listen more with the skull-brain and not the dick-brain spearheading my testicles. With Children of the Night, the Swedes have yet again morphed into a new state of being, one quite unexpected, and if you're in the mood for it, one quite poignant and passionate.

This is essentially a brand of melodic, melancholic death metal with simple chord patterns that are infused with cleaner licks, pianos, and other means to conjure up a more emotional response from the listener, and it works really damn well as long as you're not just jonesing to chew out the band for simplifying its sound a few steps below its predecessors. I've seen descriptions of this as 'indie rock' with growled vocals, and I'm not sure there's much merit to that statement, but certainly the songs take a shift towards the dramatic minimalism of pure heavy metal or hard rock and occasional chord patterns wouldn't be out of place on a driving, melodic punk record. The difference is of course that the little leads ("Melancholia") and the snarled vocal anchors it into a shadier terrain which really holds the attention if you're tracking down something which is catchy and relistenable, reminding me of what I liked a lot about an album like Sentenced's magnificent Amok or a bunch of other Finnish bands whose balance of aggression and melody was derived from the Amorphis sophomore.

Rhythm guitar patterns are quite simple in structure, but the chords issued are quite nice in conjunction with the leads, and every song bears some form of distinction, while functioning near seamlessly on the whole. Every choice of mood and shadow seems practiced and deliberate, the tempos are fairly widespread across the track list, and Johannes Andersson's nihilistic rasp is a great contrast to the sadness espoused by the instruments. I couldn't even name a singular song on here which I'd hold above the rest, because it's all so consistently wrought over the hour-long experience, and it's an album I've come back to almost as much as anything else this year. Lyrically it's also a mesmerizing record, paying ode to the personal horrors of nightmares and other intangible unknowns, a 'ghost story' as opposed to a visceral death metal record. To that extent, Tribulation have yet another winner on their hands, and I'd be lying if I said I didn't enjoy this more than the sophomore. The rare effort where the sum is the equal of its parts but any individual piece of music would be a delight taken out of the context of the entire album. Something unexpected, ethereal, but never lacking in the underpinning darkness of blacks & grays, midnight signals from haunted columns and cobbles. Aesthetically, a 'Gothic novel' of the death metal medium, its dread patient, not punishing until that very last moment when the curse or loss is recognized.

-autothrall
http://www.fromthedustreturned.com

In a world devoid of originality and quality, a small number of bands have emerged to bring excellence back to music. One of these bands is Tribulation, hailing from Sweden.

At the beginning of their career they played a style of death metal similar to that of fellow Swedes Entombed, Dismember, etc. Already on their second output, The Formulas of Death, they evolved their sound immensely from being an almost tribute-sounding act, to bringing something new to the world of metal. A broader spectrum of sounds arrived here, with clear influence from progressive rock which resulted in a long record with much more variety and depth than anything in death metal at the time.

With their new record they have stripped down, and changed, their sound a lot. While the former record had a big sound and almost epic riffing at times, this record, The Children of the Night, focuses more on clean picked guitars and atmosphere. This is not a bad thing at all because they really accomplish creating these simultaneously melancholic and eerie sounding melodies that send shivers down the listeners spine.

While their two first records were rooted in death metal, the only thing that hints at the bands earlier outputs, is Johannes Andersson's raspy vocals. Everything else seems much more influenced by the aforementioned progressive rock and perhaps black metal in the atmospheric parts. In regards of this, it must also be mentioned that every song here is more or less mid-tempo, and thereby there are no blastbeats. The drummer, Jakob Ljungberg, does not try to play as technical as possible. The drumming does its job, so to speak, without being unnecessarily spectacular. What he does is keep himself in the background but create a strong backbone for the guitars to shine.

And the guitars are certainly he highlight on this record, played by the two fantastically talented guitarists, Adam Zaars and Jonathan Hultén, who do not only write those clean guitar intros but also excellent solos that lifts this record to the next level.

From this record it becomes clear that Tribulation is a band that is true to themselves and does whatever they want as a band. From the clearly Bo Hansson-inspired instrumental Själaflykt, which features a lot of organ, like the intro song Strange Gateways Beckon, to the extremely catchy singles, In the Dreams of the Death and The Motherhood of God, the bands sounds inspired, and draw influence from a wide variety of bands, and as seems so rare in the scene nowadays, creates something original without trying to sound like their idols. An exceedingly brilliant record.

Okay, first off it is really hard for me to rank any album as 100% or perfect. Now, I hadn't heard of Tribulation until "The Children of the Night "came out this year. When I heard it, I was immediately blown away by the dark, melancholic atmosphere only to be compared to the first couple of Dissection albums. There's this weird, eerie vibe throughout the whole album that sends you to a dark Transylvanian type place. But it's only theatrical in that sense. But even though the aesthetic of the album seems fictional, the emotion behind it is so real which is why this album stands out to me so much. One more thing to point out on the subject of theatrics is their stage presentation. They dress up kind of gothic, or like vampires, which does suit the music and themes without being cheesy.

After listening to this album, I went back to check out their first couple of albums. In my opinion they were good, especially The Formulas of Death, but in no way as unique as this release. Compared to the first two full lengths, they have slowed down the pace a bit and introduced a lot more melody and atmosphere, a lot of which comes from different instruments such as xylophone and synths. Unlike their previous releases, there are no thrash or blast beats to be found on this album, but it doesn't lose any power or momentum. Despite Johannes Andersson's growled vocals, it is not simply just a death or black metal album. It also has elements of horror punk, psychedelic rock and goth as well. And even though his vocals are in the vein of death metal, the lyrics are very audible (not unlike Jon Nödtveidt of Dissection). There's also a cover song of The Cure's "One Hundred Years" on the limited edition version, which is really fitting to their style because they seem to draw inspiration from The Cure's dark, moody vibes.

Bottom line: check this album out. It deserves the recognition. "The Children of the Night" stands out among the hordes of generic, uninspired metal releases coming out. There is not a weak song on this album, but my favorites are "Melancholia", "The Motherhood of God", "Holy Libations" (which has an awesomely epic guitar solo), and one of two instrumental tracks entitled "Själaflykt." This is one of those albums where you have to listen to it from start to finish, like watching a good movie. It seems as this is the type of album that is going to separate fans because of such a stylistic shift, but I think that the shift was for the better because these guys are true musical geniuses and obviously have drive to create innovative music without being pigeon-holed into any specific genre. Hell, I can almost bet their next release won't be too similar to this one, and I hope it's not!

Tribulation has come a long way since the days of “The Horror.” The acid surge of slaughtering death metal transformed on “The Formulas of Death” to a progressive death metal template, which the band later dropped on “The Children of the Night” for a rock-based blueprint protruding from Tribulation’s death metal seeds. While the changes have been drastic, Tribulation has maintained a sense of individuality, establishing itself more as a concept than a particular sound. What “The Children of the Night” lacks in intensity it makes up for in a horror-themed brand of subtlety, lightly glazed over the band’s death metal roots and the more experimental elements of “The Formulas of Death” hiding in its cracks and fissures.

Tribulation proved early on they weren’t easy to trip up—taking on death/thrash metal in its truest form on “The Horror” proved fruitful while some have yet to even make a dent. The band’s creative skill and knack for writing excellent music are the cogs on which “The Children of the Night” gains momentum, despite showing a different trajectory. The production of the album reveals something more passive and careful; the drum sound and the heaviness of the guitars have been dialed back a bit. The songs, likewise, are structured like rock tunes, not so eager to ejaculate constant bedlam. Clean guitar lines and rocking riffs have replaced the blazing death metal aesthetic of yesteryears. There are no blast beats, no Slayer-esque solos, no recipes for annihilation.

But “The Children of the Night” merely twists the symmetry of the Tribulation dynamic into something subtle and atmospheric. The band seems more adventurous than ever in this reserved state of mind, ironically. “Strange Gateways Beckon” props up soft guitar lines between its heavy, crawling rock riffs, while “In the Dreams of the Dead” and the rocking “Melancholia” flirt passively with psychedelic influences lingering in its backdrop. The melodies and lead guitar aesthetic, especially in this style, are profound to the record’s addictive sound and its mystery. These points come to a head on the closing “Music from the Other,” a spine-chilling, shadowy opus of Tribulation becoming more than a specific sound.

The vocals are still harsh, unmistakably the same voice heaving over “The Horror” and “The Formulas of Death.” The important thing to realize is that while Tribulation’s roots are still present in lingering forms, the rock-based template brings a new energy to a paradigm that had proved itself ahead of the pack. Tribulation’s efforts prior to “The Children of the Night” were outstanding, and while it did take a while for the conditions of this evolutionary curve to make sense, the results, when fully revealed, were worth the sweat. The group’s ability to expand creatively is augmented by superb musical performances and memorable tracks, which drip with the dark genius of Tribulation. It’s important to take “The Children of the Night” for what it is, not what Tribulation was.

This review was written for: www.Thrashpit.com