Nightwish - Human bad, Nature good album review

I should make album covers for a living, I'm so great at it.

Every few years we get a new Nightwish album that tries to both sound and not sound like the previous Nightwish. Followed by a bunch of both easy and hard to please symphonic metal version of Slayer fans it's a definitely one of a kind band.

So, is Tarja era still better? Is the album worse than any Anette album? Find out when I don't answer any of these questions because who the fuck cares, here we go with

Nightwish: Omnium -[ ]- Gatherum 

Human :) Nature :( 

Orange man bad

Phone bad

Human. :||: Nature.

Human. :||: Natvre.

Get it? Because Nightwish is so trve kvlt metal satan6666!!!11 I think I'm having a stroke. Here we go:

Music (don't name your songs that way, jesus christ)
It starts slow with the both industrial and animal sounds, jungle drums, keyboards drowned in a swimming pool, then choirs, incepction trailer bwaah with a electric guitar and then enter vocals.

First thing that annoys me is that the lyrics themselves don't have any melody at all aside for the chorus. I don't expect words to rhyme because overrhyming is a sin too, but to avoid sounding like talking Floor is using a very annoying way of singing words, stretching some words while singing fast the others.
Thankfully the general structure of the song, guitar solo and drums are good enough to make it an ok opener.

There, I`ll greet the greedy crowd

But will never, ever sing to them

Well, coming from a band that has gigs organized by Live Nation it sounds really fucking stupid.

Noise

Ok intro, stupid transition, intro continues. Can't decide if it's artistic or autistic. Then the track continues into a yet another Nightwish-Hit-Single-Music-Video-Material (or NHSMVM for an easy to remember short name) which is fine, definitely shows Delain how the lyrics should be written for a good single as the chorus is a perfect blend of catchy and meaningful, no lazy millenial whoop added.

I can't say the verses are perfect though, Floor sings them so fast she loses breath at times which is audible in the song and the sins of the previous song are still visible at times (but overall it's good) 

Cool instrumental moments and ideas, like pausing a second after a strike of a big drum, speeding up in the 2/3rd. Definitely reminds the listener that Nightwish was or still is considered partially a power metal band (and now they have a drummer that can enrich those power metal elements).

Shoemaker

So far the worst of the three, the annoying way of singing is the strongest here and I can't believe no one in the band thought it's a bad idea, especially Marko who has a great sense of vocal and lyrical melody.

Instrumental parts aren't anything special either, only the opera vocals and choirs in the 3/4 of the song save it by being really good. Strong finisher for a bland, bad song.

Harvest

Jungle drums open this rather chill, almost acoustic (if not for the background) song sang well by Troy and with rather well written lyrics with just one small annyoing part ("water the field, surrended to the earth" he sings the first the so fast it sounds like "water fields" ).

But no, Nightwish couldn't have a nice, short, thematically fitting song to break the metal parts, there is an out of ass clapping followed by a totally unnecessary symphonic metal parts with a pipe and guitar solos that fucking LAST FOREVER in a typical pseudoprog fashion, followed by another out of ass idea (short radio vocals).

I don't understand why the fuck they would ruin a nice, short break from metal parts by adding the metal parts, is meeting the 5 minute mark so fucking important? The solo part is almost 90 FUCKING SECONDS LONG.

Cool idea totally ruined.

Pan

Back to no melody in the vocals. Nightwish should be glad I don't have good headphones now, because I believe there might be a flaw in the mixing but I'll take the blame for now.

This time even the chorus isn't catchy. There are some cool heavy metal parts, something Visions of Atlantis should use more in their music, especially in music videos.

The part after the second chorus, with the instrumental mess and choirs can be summarized only with this:

Very tiring and the lyrics don't suggest that this way of presentation is needed.

How's the Heart startings interestingly with heart beating before pipes come back with a vengence.

It sounds lighter and more pop-ish in the beginning but in a typical Floor-Nightwish fashion it needs to be ruined around 2/3rd of the song with experimentation. 

There's a good melody in the lyrics here but Floor still screws the chorus singing like this:

How's that heart

Underneaththesilence?

How's the one

Drowninginthemire?

To meet the 5 minute mark the last 2 minutes of the song is repeating the chorus as if it was something spectacular. Floor definitely puts her best in the last few. At least they didn't Luca Turilli'd this one with starting the song with the chorus like a retard.

Procession

Oh wow (phrase ruined by Christopher Bowes overusing it), an actually good Nightwish song. Kinda, at the very least good effort.

First of all Floor chills down with annoying way of singing, sounding more like talking and it fits the main idea of the song since it's a story with a progression in music.

The lyrics are good, even if endings of sentences could have more power + the last verse hammers down the point a bit too much, it's still fine.

The instrumental break in the middle is a bit too long (SO IMPORTANT TO MEET THAT FUCKING 5 MINUTE MARK, EH!? ) but overall, in the end it's an idea for a song realized well and it counts. So far a second song after Noise that I personally like.

Tribal

I was so close to saying "Make that a third song that I like". It starts well with a good amount of heavy sounds and Floor high and long notes followed by fast, aggressive singing and headbanging guitars afterwards along with pretty disturbing atmosphere and grunting. 120% love from me.

So what went wrong? Well Nightwish's fun police enters at 3 minute mark and adds sounds that totally bring you out of the atmosphere and sound more like Alone in the Dark movie soundtrack.

Whoever's idea was it to ruin that song- an honest fuck you.

Endlessness 

I'm not surprised my friend shared this song on facebook- it's the best on the album even if Marko sings in the same annoying fashion like Floor during the verses (thankfully not too much).

The chorus is the main selling point, catchy, with a good atmosphere and fitting Marko's voice. Everytime I hear that man singing I wish there was one more Tarot's album.

Nightwish doesn't implement any experimental ideas and lets the song proceed gracefully to the end with a fitting guitar solo too. Floor pops in for a second but only adds, she doesn't ruin anything.

Well, this album is definitely a trip. It's hard to describe as a whole, but I'll do my best.

As it's a concept album the concept part is done really well, the theme of this whole mess is presented nicely, lyrics don't repeat themselves when it comes to presenting the idea.

Lyrics are well written, there's a plenty of them and the quantity is the best quality here, because when it comes to melodic flow in the lyrics there are some very audible lacks that are patched by the style of singing, which kept annoying me through the majority of the album.

But I am willing to let them pass, because of the sheer number of words used and that they fit the concept very well.

Vocals are good and the passion of both vocalists is there, I don't like the way of singing some parts but when a certain song needs strong vocals- they are there.

Not much to say about guitars, bass and drums- drums are definitely the most rich of these three and they utilized Kai Hahto's extraordinary skills much better than on the previous album, they let him shine where he can. Riffs are quite boring, safe but the solos don't sound bad.

Background is rich with keyboards and other sounds, I'm no specialist when it comes to symphonic metal elements but they are there, well mixed in and fit the sound very nicely.

I have a lot of problems with the general structures of the songs and experimentation. I know that Nightwish has a lot of fans to please, so they need to both play it safe for the old audience, introduce enough new ideas to avoid repetition but also stay catchy.

But there's a lot of good ideas ruined by later experimentation or good ideas later ruined by trying to play it safe and sound similar to good old Nightwish.

While I'm aware it's a very difficult game to play as you can't please everyone I'm definitely not happy with the outcome.

Final score:

Vocals:   9-/10
Guitars: 7/10
Bass:      8/10
Drums:  8+/10

Additional scores:
++ very nicely realized concept of the album
++ very rich background, defintiely a must-listen to fans of symphonic crap.
+ standard nightwish quality is there when it comes to mixing and production
+ a lot of lyrics, definitely not written on a knee during a trip to the studio
+ all 3 vocalists did a good job and worked nicely in duets & choirs
+ good song placement on the album, more exhausting elements are followed by more chill stuff.
-- They tried too much to be Ayreon, Luca Turilli or Avantasia here and it failed more than it succeeded.
-- a bunch of initially good ideas ruined afterwards
- very little melody in the verses of a few songs
- very annyoing way of singing mentioned verses to avoid "talking, not singing"

Final Score: 85%. - Nightwish fans will be very happy, symphonic metal fans will be happy, power metal fans won't feel like they wasted time, new Delain album fucking sucks compared to this.

The Dark Element- Songs The Night Sings album review

A few weeks ago I reviewed my first Visions of Atlantis album for https://strong-as-hell.com and I was pretty surprised how good it was and that it will be a good opponent for Jani's new masterpiece.

Will the second album live up to the Dark Element debiut from 2017? Will it beat Wanderers?  I'm sure the answer for both those questions is 'yes' but let's find out.

Not Your Monster , track number one.
Compared to the debut's first song we have more background riffing and more background in general.
When I heard it for the first time it seemed weaker than the other 2 new singles but reviewing this album I hear it has values of it's own, especially the progressive middle instrumental part adds more complexity than it was present on the previous album. The build-up leads nicely to a vocal part enriched by the heavenly choirs before it all fells silent for the piano solo break before it goes back to headbanging. Definitely more stuff is happening compared to the debut's opener track.


Songs the Night Sings- so the titular track is second on the second album, while it was first on the first album. I don't know if that was intended but it's a fun thing to notice. Absolutely a hit song here and views on Youtube show that.
Basically the 'Omnium Gatherum's Frontiers' for symphonic metal,  a genre defining song, one you show to people when you introduce them to the genre or show the absolute best of it. From amazing structure, angelic vocals, catchy lyrics and flowing melody through rich background,  cool drum transitions to a fucking bass solo and a screaming guitar solo. Add some electronic sounds to the chorus and you can spin this track alone for an hour.


When It All Comes Down melody really reminds me of one polish electronic music song( C-BooL - Magic Symphony), definitely an interesting case as the song mixes fast intro with slow pace on vocals and very fast guitar solo where Jani goes crazy and my dick gets hard. 
I think the outro while cool and atmospheric could be tiny bit shorter, still a great song.

Silence Between The Words has a lighter tone but the lyrical themes aren't as positive as the sound. Less experimental that the last song as as usually 4th track of any album is a little break this also serves it's porpoise.

happily served porpoise

Ekhem, the outro sounds like the good years of Delain. Scratch that, it sounds better with Anette putting some strong emotions, awesome.

Pills on my Pillow [insert old gold Grabbin' Pills meme here] 

Always heard but not believed

Not even by me

Ok, this is something I wish Babymetal was more on their last album- disco mixed with symphonic metal/rock but with dark lyrical themes. The most pop Dark Element ever sounded but honestly it's just FUN as FUCK.

To Whatever End is a ballad with heavy focus on Anette's vocals and oh boy does she deliver. Anyone saying "she's a pop vocalist, not a good metal vocalist" should shut up, she can definitely deliver chills down your spine with songs that bring her best performances out. And Jani can defitely help her shine like a confinement beam at the National Ignition Facility in Livermore, California. 

Analogy brough to you by https://what-if.xkcd.com/13/


The Pallbearer Walks Alone starts almost like a melodic death metal track before going into a hit song filled with lyric repetitions in verses and bridges. While it helps to get the message clear and across I think it's tiny bit too much. Still, it's the 'good' kind of repetition so I'll give it a pass.
Some slight industrial and electronic vibes here and there, very catchy chorus and a good solo help to focus on more positive aspects of the song so in the end it's good.

Get Out Of My Head really stands out since the intro melody is cool but the lyrics are the worst so far, short and weak, it feels like even Anette isn't bringing her A game, especially heard with "is still a rose" line.
But then from 2:35 we have some weird experimentation that would work in a song if the first half wasn't so bad (or on a different song). It doesn't save the general feel that this song is a filler or should be polished a bit more.

If I Had A Heart worries me at first if it's another filler but it has enough oomph behind it with the solo, it's placement, background and Anette's performance that it deserves to be called a good song, even if it's simpler than previous songs.

You Will Learn experiments a bit with the radio voice in the beginning but then it turns into heavy headbang track and finally shifts the lyrical themes from broken hearts to self improvement which is it's highest positive, feels like a fresh puff of air after weeks spent in a small room.
Sadly the chorus is overrepeated a bit in the end (despite being great), but the outro itself is very nice.

I Have To Go is a relaxing closer to this album, sounding like a totally different genre (I'm too dumb to clearly say what). It's short, it's good, heavy focus on Anette and ends without any explosions.
So let's add some!

I'm Michael, maybe not Bay but close enough

So these are the songs that night sings, eleven of them. Could be ten which would make the album better but if Jani wants to add something more experimental than others then who am I to judge.

Jani definitely experimented more on this album than on previous one and added more power, more backgrounds without making it another Cain's Offering album so overall it sounds like an improvement over the first album- kept the catchy stuff we loved and added something new. Also as I asked during the debut review- there are more solos, so my score is higher.

Anette is without changes, still nails in almost every track and To Whatever End really stands out as probably the best song I heard her sing when it comes to vocal performance alone.

When it comes to bass and drums I heard a bass solo so hey, there's that. I didn't notice changes in the drum area, changing the drummer didn't change the sound. I will miss 'the other Jani' in this project but Rolf 'always happy to play in anything' Pilve is always welcome in any band/project.

At last compared to Wanderers it's a close match as both albums are great. But I'll take experimental over sexy boi Michele and tentacle porn anyday. And yes, without context it looks even worse than with.

Final score:

Vocals:   10/10
Guitars: 10+/10
Drums:   9/10

Additional scores:
+ still catchy
+ still complex (more than on the debut)
+ still cool lyrics
+ still great mixing
+ still good song placement on the album
+ overall a good follow up to the debut, lives up to the highly set expectations, like Silence to Ecliptica
- there are some failed experiments and repetitions
- While there's improvement I still think more varied lyrical themes could be good for the project, a lot of broken heart related songs here.
+ Anette isn't from Finland, she's from Sweden. I didn't know that during my first review so now I give her a plus as an apology since the score doesn't matter anyway.

Final Score: 109%. A must-listen to any Jani and Anette fan, definitely a money/time well spent for anyone else.

PS:  score for Bass guitar was 9+/10, I just like to joke with bass scores in my reviews since I never hear bass. Sorry I explained the joke, I just ruined it, now Karol won't love me anymore. Which also without context looks at least a little weird.

PPS: back from my 2017 review:

I am so sorry for being a lazy shit, I bet it's wonderful though

I forgot- since there's a small chance Anette/band will publish my extremely weird review on facebook I should write a sentence that summarizes the album well and shows my proficiency in album reviewing.. Uhh, ok, here it goes:

This masterpiece from Finnish Swedish Scandinavian duo Jani Liimatainen & Anette Olzon shows the world that symphonic metal can be something more fun than snooze-inducing, recycled Nightwish clones. It's fun, experimental and Frontiers please give them money for a tour after you fix your warehouse issues of course.

aaand I think I failed. Thanks for reading, You're the best.

Sonata Arctica " Talviyö" review

OH BOY HERE I GO REVIEWING AGAIN!

Let's start by showing how the summary of the last album went:

This is a perfect summary of my relation to that band. I probably won't see it live again, but who knows. I won't trust them to deliver good music as well. But for now I smile, the music is better than it was, and who knows? It might be a new start.

So let's see how my 'new start' went after past 3 years of having a love-hate relationship with Sonata Arctica. Will it be our last amazing grays or should they don't say a word again? Let's jump in with the first track on the album Message from the Sun 

Wow, semi fast tempo was something I didn't expect from them anymore. Positive, magical vibes of the song are taken down by absolute lack of power in the vocals, hidden behind multi-layered lines that suggest it's a song where the audience sings along in order to hide Tony's declining skill in singing. Lyrics are solid but there are some strange decisions (for example the outro cuts rather weakly with Glow, the meaning divine of the rhymes in the snow. )
The sound is absolute plastic, it starts rather strong with a slower intro but with each second I think more and more "why do they need guitars in that music anymore? Elias's parts are treated like shit". Solo in the 2/3 of the songs starts weak like hell, I needed to play it again since I already forgot how forgettable it was.

Overall a bad start, tiny bit better than Closer to an Animal from the last album, but there Tony sounded more interested in what he's singing. A pity, it had potential to be a bridge between Winterheart's Guild and Unia's Sonata eras with a handful of ideas taken from both of these albums but the mixing and weak vocals ruined this opportunity.

Whirlwind is a second track and the intro part sounds rather interesting (just like with the last song) for the first 50 second, then the tone shifts by 180 degrees. And after a few minutes more we finally have a good Sonata song. Ok, time to explain.
It shows how important is a vocalist puting some emotions and effort in a song- it's clearly hearable he's more invested here. Thematically it's a mix between Broken and Only The Broken Hearts (Make You Beautiful) , the structure (excluding the intro) is very right and the song progresses nicely.
You can hear someone who is during the healing process, being both optimistic for the recovery and struggling during the winter times (which adds to the winter night tone of the album).

It's good, but I cannot say "omg they NAILED IT!". First of all the production is still far from perfect, I don't think I need to explain, it's been a bigger or smaller issue since Pariah Child. Second- the intro- from the moment electric guitars enter it doesn't fit the motive at all, or I'm not understanding something right. Then the tone of the song is all around- the 'happy' parts are just too happy (Tony is almost TOO invested in sounding happy, he could channel it to the previous song) and transition to the sadder parts could be made less abrupt. Instrumental parts with the previously not fitting electric guitar don't help set the climate either.
The outro also struggles during the 4:55 - 5:22 part with some weird ideas and repetitions.

Cold is third and I heard it before on Youtube. Album's quality is much better but it doesn't help with 2 things - Tony's bored and uninvested singing and very slow tempo. Multiple comments on youtube were right that this songs sounds quite decent on 1,25 tempo.
I think the worst part is transition to a (finally) decent guitar solo, the vocals just don't give a shit. To a point where I remember George Carlin's quote about God:

So, if there is a God, I think most reasonable people might agree that he's at least incompetent, and maybe, just maybe, doesn't give a shit. Doesn't give a shit! Which I admire in a person, and which would explain a lot of these bad results.”

Tony doesn't give a shit here, his album will still sell enough copies to have a living, there will still be enough fangirls and "Sonata come to Chile" people in the comments plus some delusionals that will read sponsored by Nuclear Blast album reviews saying "hey Sonata is back with their best album yet!". When you are burned out and don't need to push yourselves to do better then why should you?

I digress, back to the review, Cold is shit that again- could be a lot better with a very little effort, move on to Storm the Armada
Now this one is pretty interesting- Tony's invested in singing again BUT the production pushed him behind everything, his vocals here are so behind that I think most of them are in the booklet.
There are some quirks connected to that, like his someway in 2:31 being more audible than the rest of the lyrics which sounds really bizzare, like a novice mistake on a mixing table, unfit for 10th fucking album from them.
This song is all around the place, I had no idea what are they trying to say with multiple instrumental parts, tone shifts and lyrics about seemingly just random shit but the ending is clearing out the message- THE BEES

It's weird and I don't like it, moving on, maybe like Zeroes I will start to like it after multiple listens but probably not because Zeroes had a decent audio engineering behind it.

The Last of the Lambs. LISTENING TO THIS SONG IS PAIN, MORE THAN NICHOLAS CAGE ABOVE IS FACING. MOVING THE FUCK ON. DON'T LISTEN TO IT, GET A SOFTWARE THAT CAN ERASE TRACK 5 FROM THE CD OR SOME SHIT.

Who Failed The Most - You did Sonata, a few seconds ago releasing the worst song since Love and following with a bland, badly mixed, too slow piece with Tony's bored vocals. This song is not worth talking more about it, it barely has any redeeming values.

Ismo's Got Good Reactors - best song on the album. Why? No vocals. Therefore harder to fuck up the mixing. Interesting riffs and nice fast tempo with some uplifting, even oriental melodies.
Maybe consider kicking Tony out of the band? It looks like he's the weakest part of the band nowadays. The story behind the song's name is also quite fun.

Demon's Cage . Ok, first of all how dare you mention the "C" word here, The Cage was and is an amazing song from the Sonata's best, flawless era and this is .. A lot of repetition, a lot of experimentation that absolutely fucks the dynamic of the song- there is no flow, some vocals are written by an idiot. It's just hard to listen to, after 3 minutes I struggle to pay attention to it.
I wonder why they repeat the same melodic line, it's not that good really..

A Little Less Understanding is a little less bad, but also a little more disappointing since it was the first song of the album shown to the public and it wasn't anything amazing. Turns out it was one of the "good" songs on the album with Tony's soft voice being kinda invested in singing, there are no dumb experiments and just a lot of repetition (but the melody is nicer so it's.. ok?).
I have a little less understanding what they wanted to say with this album, maybe "we are really scraping the bottom of the barrel on this one, in 3 years we really couldn't think of anything better". Oh, and the most cheesy solo is here, in the worst meaning of the word.

The Raven Still Flies is a story, I think. I'm not sure. Probably something written on the back of the album package

JARI FOR THE LAST TIME FUCK OFF WITH YOUR FOREST PACKAGE, I GAVE YOU 50 EURO WHAT MORE DO YOU WANT!? LEAVE ME ALONE!

...
So as I was saying something on the back of the album package

fuck off, for older fans to buy it thinking it's maybe something connected to Wolf & Raven.

I hope You know.. I hope You know

No Tony I have no idea what you want to say with this song.

During the instrumental part I'm really lost, it's just another experimentation song, something that should never exit the demo phase. Something that Devin Townsend thinks of in the middle of the night and puts on Youtube as "thought leftovers" with some very disturbing images on a Youtube video. God I digress so bad but this album is just so bland, boring, meaningless and THE LAST SONG, HERE WE FUCKING GO!

Some Galneryus break to recharge batteries, phew, The Garden

Just 6 minutes, after painfully stretched last songs, I can do it! Oh it's like a ballad I think, soft and calm, like observing a cold winter wind behind a window of a warm room under a blanket with a cup of cocoa in a hand. 

At least that what I was hoping for, in time it's just too boring, too long and too sweet, to a point where I start worrying about diabetes. I'll give it a pass.

Ok, so I think I need to write a summary now.

It's bad. Is it Pariah Child bad? I don't know, it's like comparing cat shit to dog shit, in the end it doesn't matter which is worse since both are shit.

Why are there 11 songs on this album? Couldn't they skip a few and call it a day? It might have helped with some of the problems but in the end we have 2 good songs, 4 bland but passable and 5 bad/boring ones. The worst part is that you cannot blame shit audio engineering and bored vocals for all the problems here. That and that we waited 3 years and the band wasn't particulary active in that time so they cannot justify bad writing with little time they had to come up with something for this album.

I really don't want to talk about this cd anymore so;

Vocals: 2/10

Guitars: 3/10

Keyboards: 6/10

Drums: 8/10

Bass: Just fuck you Pasi/10

Additional: 

+ There is one song that has that Sonata feeling. I really appreciate it, it made me for a minute feel young again.

--- mixing

-- vocalist sounds like he doesn't want to be there more often than not

- a lot of experimentation that shouldn't appear on a final product

- everything out of touch, out of place, all bloated, too long, not necessary. It just lacks essence and message.

- major disappointment after the previous album which had it's moments

Final score: 24% oh how the mighty have fallen, hopefully it's the last one or they will have a major reinventing afterwards because this album is broken. As the song with that title says Once again hope I died for the last time