Caliban
The Undying Darkness

THE REVIEW

Here is a highly anticipated album for metalcore fanatics, and more specifically for fans of this group. Caliban immediately stood out in this genre with their early, fiercely powerful works that showcased their quality as musicians (particularly noteworthy are the vocalist and drummer). Since the album "The Opposite From Within", with the shift to RoadRunner Records, we've noticed a slight diminishing of their musical power, which nevertheless does not detract at all. This album seems like another step towards eliminating the ferocity that, despite the frequent outbursts almost akin to black metal and the singer's powerful voice, not to mention the purely thrash guitar riffs, seems to lose tone.

For metalcore fans, it is certainly a worthy album, albeit with some clear commercial influences: It starts with an Intro that sets the atmosphere of the album, then launches into the devastating power of I Rape Myself, an excellent track with a very compelling guitar riff. This is followed by Song About Killing, which is already more aggressive on the whole but with a less sustained tempo; a track that generally fits within the known and appreciated Caliban standards from "The Opposite From Within"; It's Our Burden To Bleed, with a purely black metal start, ends up losing a bit of tone, despite the aggression that is felt throughout its almost four minutes (3:48). The next track, Nothing Is Forever, shows some direct hints towards the new generations who appreciate Nu Metal and this type of music, with a beginning almost like Foo Fighters, continuing in the classic Caliban style; Together Alone, in my opinion, is not a very interesting track that ends up being banal, especially after listening to the preceding tracks; My Fiction Beauty, with some thrash elements and slightly calmer sounds, follows the logical thread of the rest of the album, proving to be quite enjoyable; then comes No More 2nd Chances, with a rather thrash scheme that doesn't offer anything new compared to many other Caliban songs, on the contrary, it quickly becomes repetitive; I Refuse To Keep On Living..., with some clean parts that are too calm for what Caliban should be doing, is a track almost devoid of personality, probably the only one so far not following the band's fixed pattern; Sick of Running Away, another track with clean and less violent parts, stands in antithesis to other tracks like those at the start of the album, is nothing special, and almost reveals a repetitiveness from the group, with choruses almost like P.O.D.; Moment Of Clarity, the meanest track on the album is perhaps the only one still inspired by the group's early albums, despite the distortion being less aggressive as we have become accustomed to with their latest works; Room Of Nowhere, the last track, is another photocopy already heard a thousand times not only with Caliban, with a Black Metal-style sung chorus but with a very atypical distortion for this genre.

In the end, the album has nothing characteristic or particular, and it's the classic metalcore album like many other groups (see Killswitch Engage, Demon Hunter, etc.); the aggressiveness that has always distinguished this band clearly begins to give way to a more market-friendly "fake violence," Cradle of Filth style. Nevertheless, the band has not lost its vigor, and for genre fanatics, the album might be anything but dull. Recommended only for metalcore and Caliban fans...