Evergrey – The Storm Within

[schema type=”review” name=”Evergrey-The Storm Within” description=”Label: AFM Records” author=”Gamze Öyünc” pubdate=”2016-09-09″ ]

Swedish metallers Evergrey is back with their 9th studio album, “The Storm Within”. The Swedes have surely mastered their craftsmanship over the years since their 1st release back in 1998 and now you can see the solid proof of the final outcome of their virtuosity on this album.
I started listening to Evergrey upon the release of Phantasma’s Project album “The Deviant Hearts”. Evergrey frontman Tom Englund contributed to it for one of the songs. I was impressed by it right away and therefore with this album I feel damned ashamed and remorseful that I hadn’t discovered them before.

1st single and video choice for release, “Distance” starts the engine. It’s one of the two heaviest songs off the album, the other one is the mighty “My Allied Ocean”. With these two tracks; I would add the adjectives; “kinda proggy, dark melodic metal” to the genres that have been used to describe this band’s sound. I immediately become magnetized by Englund’s clean vocals. I am quite fond of metal music in general which features clean vocals, so his vocals appealed to me right away. The band is known to have made a couple of concept albums before, and Englund says this one is a “love-themed” album which has an interstellar setting. This interstellar atmosphere can be seen on the cover art and heard from the mood that the keyboards ooze out.

“Passing Through” gives the power-metal vibes with those melodic dynamics between keyboards and riffs. I really like this track even though it winks to the catchy mainstream rock as a genre, but it’s all good for a melodic-metal sucker like me. Moving on to the other tracks like “Astray” has made me want to rotate the album a few more times. It’s a really versatile track, I like the atmospheric shifts between the bridges and the chorus. It’s dark, it’s grand and it has one kick-ass guitar solo. “In Orbit” is one of the two duets with Floor Jansen of Nightwish. It is such a melodic-rock hit, with cool lyrics. Definitely one of my favorites off the album! The next one is “The Lonely Monarch” and it’s definitely a no-filler.
To be honest, keyboards has been the most appealing factor for this album, they’re blending perfectly with catchy choruses and quite melodic riffs as well as brilliant, crystal clear guitar solos by Henrik Danhage.

Beautiful ballad “The Paradox of the Flame” features Mr. Englund’s wifey, Carina Englund. It is a moving ballad which transforms into a great lament with sentimental but grandiose strings through the end of the song. Carina’s voice can be described as “powerfully fragile”, it surely multiplies the intensity of the song with strong female vocals.

“The Storm Within” can well be described as Evergrey’s most dynamic album up-to-date. The dark is still injected in there but be sure to expect high-octaned, vibrant lyrics with dramatic lyrics. Even if you only like Melodic Death Metal from Sweden, you’ll definitely have a crush on “The Storm Within”.

Tracklist: 01. Distance 02. Passing Through 03. Someday 04. Astray 05. The Impossible 06. My Allied Ocean 07. In Orbit (Feat. Floor Jansen) 08. The Lonely Monarch 09. The Paradox of the Flame (Feat. Carina Englund) 10. Disconnect 11. The Storm

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