Band's List Melodic Death Euphoreon Euphoreon

So, after searching for epic metal bands on last.fm, I soon realized I didn't know what to expect, seeing as Epic Metal is an umbrella term and not a legitimate genre of metal, so when trying to find music that "gives you goose bumps", its all derived from opinion, making it even harder to find. I stumbled upon "Before the Blackened Sky", a free downloadable demo via last.fm created by a guy named Matt Summerville. It basically blew me away, fulfilling my craving for "Epic Metal". After giving rightful praise to the band on their profile, Matt Summerville contacted me, and after talking many times, he made me aware of the upcoming full length, with the drummer from Far Beyond, Eugen Dodenhoeft, who I was aware of, and are a great band as well.

When it was released I knew I could expect great things to come from the duo, and they didn't let me down. The bands genre is very hard to describe, they are not melodic death by any means, although they do have heavy melodic influence from european bands currently popular in the metal underground, (a la Norther, Wintersun, Children of Bodom, etc.). They also have slight black metal influence, as well as power metal influences, toped off with heavy keyboard orchestration passages, completing their epic sound. They re-worked the 3 songs from Matt's online demo, as well as added 6 extra songs, which are all fantastic. I was impressed by the great addition of real drums, as opposed to drum machines of the demo, brilliantly thrown in, with clever drum hooks in between keyboard and lead guitar parts, which is a hard skill to idealize. The songs are memorable, and capture a triumphant feel, which are completed with agressive vocals from both members of the band.

From New Zealand, a country absent of many good metal bands, this project has made a great edition into the modern melodic metal trend in the past few years, yet it still maintains a unique sound that will leave you with a feeling of some familiarity, but still has enough new musical ideas to catch your attention. With todays pathetic use of the word "Epic", used by teenagers to describe the most recent Seth Rogan Movie they saw last Saturday, or the new addition of a Hot Topic at their local Mall, it has become tainted. However, this album will bring justice to the word to describe something gargantuan, triumphant, and with a sense of wonder. Epic should be used rightfully so, and I suppose Metal Music today is a new arc to carry it by. If your into aggressive vocals mixed with Symphonic, Melodic, and/or Power metal, I recommend giving this LP a listen. Download it for free off of their website, and support them if you enjoy the LP and buy the album.