The metallers from the deep south (well, Seattle, but that’s
\ndeep to me) return with their most experimental album to date.<\/p>\n
I’ve always been a big fan of Nevermore, and this was the album
\nthat really opened my eyes to their musical and lyrical
\nintricacy.<\/p>\n
The album starts on a strange note. The 0:46 intro track is
\ncomprised of whirring helicopters, a heart monitor flatlining, and
\na strange voice saying “We’ve been waiting for you.” Finally, we’re
\nhit with an exploding riff by lead guitarist Jeff Loomis, and the
\nsupremely powerful vocals of Warrel Dane. From then on in, we’re
\ntaken on a wild ride in this semi-concept album. From what I’ve
\nbeen able to piece together through painstaking hours of research
\n(or, more correctly, five minutes on a search engine) was that this
\nalbum tells the story of a man who’s love drowns in a lake, and he
\nslowly goes mad, and starts to blame things like religion and
\npolitics. Finally, in the haunting finale, he commits suicide, by
\nthrowing himself in the same lake his love fell into.<\/p>\n
This entire album is very complex, both musically and lyrically.
\nDane’s amazing voice can turn from melancholy lamenting over his
\nlost love, to his stern vocals, usually affiliated with cursing
\nsomething, to his fantastic falsettos, all within a matter of
\nseconds. Jeff Loomis continues to create some of the greatest, most
\nmultilayered solos ever imaginable, and also making some ingenious
\nriffs.<\/p>\n
Of the many highlights of this album, one of the main ones would
\nbe the interesting “ballads”. I call them that simply because they
\nare not spine-shattering metal assaults. The two on this album
\nwould be the title track, adeptly showcasing Dane’s vocal range,
\nand Loomis’ guitar virtuosity, and ‘The Lotus Eaters’, a
\ntear-jerking track, seemingly about a plea to God, with down-tuned
\nguitars, and Dane’s heart-wrenching singing over top.<\/p>\n
But to balance out the album, we’d need to blistering metal!
\nThis comes in almost all of the tracks, but the greats of these
\nwould be ‘I Am the Dog’, a fast-paced track detailing the main
\ncharacter’s descent into madness (“And everything I used to be\/has
\nspiraled into insanity\u2026”), and ‘Poison Godmachine’, a track
\nsounding very similar to their previous album, The Politics of
\nEcstasy, with powerfully anti-media lyrics.<\/p>\n
Much like all concept albums,
\nDreaming Neon Black<\/i> ends with the epic, haunting track
\n‘Forever’, in which the character decides to “join his love” by
\n“swimming through her”. His last words are the echoing “I’m
\ndreaming neon black”. Followed by a seven-minute silence. Finally,
\njust as the album is about to end, we here the helicopter blades,
\nand the sinister voice, saying triumphantly “We’ve been waiting for
\nyou”. Simply majestic.<\/p>\n
This is by far one of the better metal releases out their.
\nLoomis’ amazing guitar skills have placed him on many a metal fan’s
\ntop 10 lists, while Dane is a marvelous vocalist. Nevermore does no
\nwrong with this CD, and by picking it up, you shall do no wrong
\neither.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":41,"featured_media":26561,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[6951],"rating":[5646],"class_list":["post-37801","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-nevermore","rating-rating-a"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/37801","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/41"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37801"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/37801\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26561"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37801"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=37801"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=37801"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}