As Hope Dies
Legions Bow To A Faceless God

This review is dedicated to Aniel: I dedicate it to him because he is the melodic Death enthusiast, I dedicate it to him because I feel like I'm stealing this review from him. Yes, because I'm not a fan of these sounds while he is, yet I feel the categorical imperative calling me to do it.

Before starting, I would like to clarify a couple of things: first of all, what is melodic Death. This type of metal, born in the early nineties (that is about five years after non-melodic Death and roughly at the same time as even less melodic Death, Brutal), is based on the musical patterns of Death, or rather Thrash Death; alongside the classic clichés of this genre (the classic "triplet" rhythms) we find the growling vocals or more frequently screaming typical of Death. The true characteristic, as the name suggests, is however the melody, shared albeit in different ways with other subgenres of metal such as Power and Gothic; Melodeath makes extensive use of twin guitars and generally a riffing rich in scales and minor chords that gives the genre its distinct sad and dramatic aura. It is not uncommon, in fact it is almost a constant, the use of keyboards to amplify the atmosphere: however, their use is far from the massive "pianistic" performances typical of Symphonic Black groups and, even worse, in Power Epic groups.

The songs are often rich in references to local Folk music and here we arrive at the second premise; where does melodic Death come from? Melodic Death, not surprisingly, is also called Swedish Death, clearly referring to the most fertile land in this field; and it is indeed Sweden, particularly around the city of Gothenburg, that gave birth to seminal groups like In Flames, At The Gates, Dark Tranquillity, and Unanimated, to mention the most important names. It's common to find, at least in the early records of these sacred monsters (as in "Lunar Strain" by In Flames or "The Gallery" by Dark Tranquillity) acoustic intermezzo taken from traditional Scandinavian music, genuine trademarks of Melodeath that hindered its spread to other parts of the world and even Europe. It is quite rare indeed to find bands of this genre outside the borders of the Nordic lands: but instead Tepes surprises you all and brings you a Swedish Death band from the United States...
happy?
Surely not, firstly because no one gives a damn about the music I review and secondly because someone like Aniel, or Ozzyrotten, or worse still Fjeltronen (the man from the icy lands) will start making grimaces and noises that will only end at the end of the review or the moment they listen to the album.

Our American friends have learned the lesson from the aforementioned bands (a bit less from Unanimated) and have presented it to their compatriots and beyond in three different discs, a Mini CD, and two LPs; after which they closed shop and went their separate ways. Why? And here's a debaser-like Who-gives-a-!©... let's focus on the album, as I'm already digressing here.

Although I am not a capital "A" admirer ("A", just to be clear), I've gone through quite a bit of Melodeath lately and have almost always been disappointed. By now the bands are only more Melo and not Death, resulting in a series of albums where keyboards dominate and have diuretic effects on me (Eternal Tears Of Sorrow, Obscurant, and others). As Hope Dies, on the other hand, draw from the glorious past of this genre, maybe lingering a bit more on its Death origin (strange from a band that previously played Hardcore Punk). But the best part is that this is not even the thing that makes me prefer As Hope Dies over the other hundreds of Melodeath bands, rather the fact that these guys play it damn well, in my opinion much better than many others with a much larger career and fame. The bands they mainly draw on are At The Gates and In Flames from the golden era (especially in the vocals) even though there are references to Dark Tranquillity; the technical rate, as always for bands dedicated to these sounds, is at a medium-high level and includes quite articulated guitar riffing without however overdoing it in terms of virtuosity so as not to affect the mood.

As Hope Dies speak of sadness and despair and sadistically linger on the last ray of light, on "the death of hope", on emotional pain; at least that's what the listening communicates, but reading the lyrics reminds of the Hc origin of the band and therefore an injurious critique towards religions. But in this case one can also turn a blind eye and perhaps focus on the splendid drumming, halfway between the tested canons of Melodeath and a taste for classic Death, visible in the blast beats and other technicalities. It cannot be said that the drummer exceeds his colleagues in skill, but he matches them excellently and keeps his name high in a scene that usually does not give much space to newcomers. But the best comes with the singing, absolutely excellent: our vocalist manages to modulate the voice wisely and alternate between clean screaming and growling that match perfectly with the riffing. In short, a performance that surpasses in intensity even the best singers of the genre. The same goes for the compositional aspect of the songs, definitely inspired and above average, indeed, on par with the great masterpieces of the past like "The Jester Race" or "Clayman" (to mention those with whom I notice the most similarities); the songs are well written, not predictable at all (thanks to that Death aftertaste that I like so much) and definitely in line with what fans of this genre expect.

Perhaps the material proposed is not brand new, but I have no doubts about the rating it deserves: today you don't hear many records like this and moreover, it must be recognized that this "Legions Bow To A Faceless God" has been able to echo the best of Scandinavian Death of the nineties. And believe me, that's not a small feat.