Artist: WaterlandAlbum: Virtual TimeReleased: 2010A mixture of styles and genres: Melodic Speed Power Metal Review:It is a second album of the band called Waterland from Portugal; the first
one,
although a demo, was quite as good as a full-length album. OK, this was a
digression for statistics.
Well, the second album. What has changed, appeared, disappeared and
transformed?
This album has changed my perception of this band completely! It seems
that the
main lineup is the same as well as the music trend and priorities, but
I've
completely ceased perceiving this band as a sort of resemblance to Skylark
with
a specific sound of keyboards. Now the keyboards sound differently, maybe,
more
electronically, but it in no way destroys normal Metal sound. We can
recall the
early Labyrinth (Italy) for comparison, where Italian Melodic
Speed&Power and
electronic sound of the synthesizer are well matched.
The double voice (two rightful singers) is in the groove again, nothing
superfluous or unnatural.
The music varies from epic Heavy mid-tempo songs with the respective
voices to
the standards of the fast Italian Melodic Speed&Power a-la Rhapsody
and the
mentioned Labyrinth, and even to the hyper-speed music a-la
Dragonforce.
But the main discovery for me is that the ordinarily structured songs,
which
seem simple at first sight, stick in mind immediately, and a minute later
you
wish to sing along as if you've known them long since. It may be explained
by
the fact that the structure and sound of many songs remind of pop music,
for
instance, the music of such hit generators, as ABBA and Modern
Talking.
I want to recall that finishing the review on the debut demo I expressed a
hope
that Waterland would be better than Oratory (the band, which the main
musicians
of Waterland came from) in future. And it happened! Go ahead, Waterland,
win
the tops!
Summary:| Vocals: | 10.00 of 10 | | Instruments: | 9.00 of 10 | | Skill: | 10.00 of 10 | | Originality: | 7.00 of 10 | | TOTAL: | 9 of 10 |
Reviewed by: Denis /30.11.2010/ |
