Tuesday 28 April 2015

Orpheus Blade - Wolf's Cry (CD Review)



01.Shadows Still
02.The Finest Art of Feeding
03.The Becoming
04.Under Dying Stars
05.In Sickness and in Hell
06.The Death of All Morrows
07.Dismissal
08.In Terms of Twilight
09.Because He's Made of Flesh
10.For Each Man Kills
11.Chronicles
12.The Man Who Cried Wolf
13.Shapeshifter

Adi Bitran (Vocals)
Henning Basse (Vocals)
Gal Ben Haim (Guitar)
Edi Lemishov (Bass)
Shaked Furman (Drums)


Israeli band formed in 2012.Progressive and heavy metal, film music and musicals, a concept fantasy that is really an allegory to real life endeavors – these are just some of the cornerstones of the band led by talented singer/songwriter Adi Bitran.
Armed with an attitude of “all or nothing” that has made her almost bleed for her creation and never choosing to take the easy road, Adi has selected only the best to accompany her in this journey for her first album.
“Wolf’s Cry” has been in the making for nearly six years. This was necessary as Adi patiently waited for the “right hands” that would help her shape it into the strong and unique piece of music it deserved to be. And when long-time friend Erez Yohanan (AMASEFFER) stepped in that was it - Adi and Erez spent endless hours and long months in the studio rewriting, rearranging, producing and polishing everything, creating a mature album with a strong backbone.



After the intro we get some spoken lyrics over a very melodic intro on 'The Finest Art Of Feeding' but the words get angry and then wow what a powerfull voice suddenly comes to life, as does the music a very heavy symphonic sound with agressive drumming, once the song gets into full swing and Adi's vocals come in as well, this turns into symphonic metal heaven, some nice timing changes and acoustic breakdowns, all this wrapped up in 7 great minutes.

'The Becoming' is more of the same, but the second half of the song is more classical until right at the end which has a stunning little vocal battle.

Now 'Under Dying Stars' may start in the same style, witnear power metal precision, but its when it all slows down, that the haunting and quite superb vocals of Adi come through the speakers sending a chill down the spine.

The next piece is just the male vocal over a very simple symphonic keyboard, until the guitars and drum comes in right at the end, this clever and stunning blend of musical styles is followed by more spoken words on 'The Death Of All Morrows', which then leads straight into 'Dismissal'.
An epic multi-layered piece at just over 9 minutes, with a stunning production it manages to have little sparks of power metal, mixing with ballad, symphonic and almost every other style you can think of.

'In Terms Of Twilight' is almost a pop style euro ballad thing, not as out of place as you might think on this amazing album, oh and at the end gets all Angela Gossgow!!

After another 2 great songs we come to the short 'Chronicles' which really does sound like something from a musical, a dark show tune it may be but sung perfectly.

After an instrumental the last song 'Shapeshifter' is another song that has that epic movie soundtrack feel to it.

Rating 10/10
For Fans Of: Nightwish, Epica, Tristania, Within Temptation, Opera Diabolicus, Therion

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