Bring Me The Horizon, UK based metalcore band has its comeback with newly released album Sempiternal!
I remember when I was a teenager and BMTH was one of the top bands within -core genres. Honestly, I have never been a huge fan of them. Why? Well, I might have been young and foolish... But... My main problem was that I tend to get lost in their songs and I could not make sense out of the sounds. Yeah, might sound weird, but that was it. Neverthless, couple of months ago, I came across their album There Is a Hell, Believe Me, I've Seen It. There Is a Heaven, Let's Keep It a Secret (2010) thanks to my good friend Dwayne. I was skeptical at first as their past music did not really leave an impression on me, but I gave it a try. And... I was surprised... In a good way of course. The whole album had a totally different wibe to it. It is pretty hard to describe what I mean by it. It is like, you listen to a song and it leaves a distinct feeling inside and you can just instantly relate to it, no matter what. It creates an instant memory, and instant imprint on your soul. They left the good old roughness to it, nice guitars, good beat. They newly incorporated more electronic features to it and also you could hear more transitions from fast to slower pace, which gave the songs a different dynamic. For some reason, I find that Oli improved quite a bit in vocals and I have to say, I got addicted to several songs on that album thanks to that.
Now, let´s talk about Sempiternal. Shadow Moses was a good preview to the whole album. The song was released some time ago along with their official videoclip. The song is really catchy, and the melody is easy to remember (for those who like to sing along just like me). The guitars are pretty good and what I love the most is the "choir/church" effect they used throughout the whole song. This gives little etherial feel - which goes with the whole Sempiternal idea. SO, as a preview of the whole album, it was pretty decent.
I got my hands on their newly born Sempiternal album only a few days ago. I had to first let it sink in a little before I could give my honest opinion on it... You know how it goes, it might not hit you straight away. So, the first song I tried out was Can You Feel My Heart. I saw several people raving about this song so I decided to start out with it. It has a distinct electronic vibe to it incorporating decent drums and guitars. The lastest albums differ from the old BMTH with vocals. Again, in this album, Oli is less counting on screaming, the vocals are more melodic and milder than before. In this song, there were used the same features and similar melody as in Shadow Moses which I guess was the intention to tie all the songs together and create the Sempiternal feeling. Hospital for souls is again, one of the more emotional songs in the album. Vocals change from talking/singing to emotion filled screaming. The song is decent, the pace often changes from slow/instrumental like to fast and metal-like. Another stronly raved about song was Sleepwalking. Again, very melodic with easy to follow and catchy melody. The song are pretty similar music and pace-wise.
With the album, the band released bit by bit the booklet with custom made graphics which was very creative and different. It increased this different vibe of the album.
All in all, the album is pretty decent. Not BMTH how we know it. I like the attempt to vamp up the band and to try something new. I like a lot the melodic parts and strong guitars. Love the emotional feel to the songs, the lyrics are honest and at times heartbreaking. However, I think something is missing in the album. Hard to say what but it misses something. Oh well, they did pretty good overall I think. Might not be everybody´s cup of tea, let´s say it straight away. Might be too mild for the ones who are used to listen good old hard-core/metal-core. But then again, worth trying out!
xoxo Monika
