Visions of Atlantis: Wanderers

Arguably never has a band so aptly named an album. Wandering is a pretty good description of what Visions of Atlantis have been doing for much of their fifteen career. Wandering around the lower reaches of the call-it-whatever-you-want genre but often named female-fronted metal or symphonic metal. Whatever they've always been somewhat left behind despite some pretty good releases especially the recent The Deep & The Dark and subsequent live album which put a full stop on their career and enabled the band to move forward, hopefully without yet more line-up changes because Wanderers is perchance their crowning achievement thus far.

Certainly their record company think so and they opine that, “This will be the most intense and profound Symphonic Metal album that the world has seen in the last 15 years.� Wow. They have even manged to get some well-known metal names to voice support in the advertising literature:

“A big congratulations for this album, I love the title track!“
(Alissa White-Gluz / Arch Enemy)

“Bold, diverse and captivating! VOA returns with an album ready to launch the band to the next level!�
(Thomas Younglood / Kamelot)

“Strong songs with amazing choruses.�
(Mark Jansen / Epica)

Do you know what? They're all correct. Well, the metal luminaries, not sure about the record company quote but this is the most consistent set of Vision of Atlantis tunes ever, musically there are plenty of echoes back to the sound of The Deep & The Dark but a bit of self plagiarism never hurt anybody. I'd like to draw particular attention to the three ballads which are all excellent. "Into the Light" is the less overwrought of the three but the single "Nothing Lasts Forever" is really special and has a cool Stealing Beauty video which is neat. The tite track featurea powerhouse performance from Clémentine Delauney The album is lyrically interesting as well, I assume from Delauney. Here's a sample from "Into the Night".

“There’s a voice that I hear and it seems like a call
At night, when I cannot find sleep It’s the sound of the void, that can entrap us all,
The beast that hides in the deep As it reaches out with thousand arms
Grasping the hull of the ships It’s the omen of doom from the songs I recall
A terror that makes grown men weep “

This is the first full album to feature male vocalist Michele Guaitoli and whilst he mostly stays more in the background than Delauney his presence is felt throughout and hopefully he's in it for the long haul because this jus might be the time for VOA.

Track Listing:
1. Release My Symphony
2. Heroes Of The Dawn
3. Nothing Lasts Forever
4. A Journey To Remember
5. A Life Of Our Own
6. To The Universe
7. Into The Light
8. The Silent Scream
9. The Siren & The Sailor
10. Wanderers
11. At The End Of The World

Added: September 3rd 2019
Reviewer: Simon Bray
Score:
Related Link: Band Facebook Page
Hits: 1005
Language: english

[ Printer Friendly Page ]
[ Send to a Friend ]