Type O Negative
Dead Again

THE REVIEW

Black Sabbath meets Misfits, this time that’s the formula.

The giant green man (not Hulk) or Lurch’s brother (call him what you want) is back: “Dead Again” is perhaps the TON album that most shows and synthesizes the various influences and facets of their music, where they move from Black Sabbath to punk'n'roll speeds with extreme ease.
Following indeed the punk coordinates of the previous ones like "i don’t wanna be me" or "i like goils", they have indeed emphasized the punk/hardcore component, no longer relegating it to episodes for their own sake like those mentioned above, but inserting it into the doom context, where the two styles alternate with each other through more or less sudden accelerations or slowdowns (see: sinking into the green marshy slime): it’s a delight to hear them move from massive doom boulders to splinters as if it were nothing.

Doom, punk, hardcore, sludge, gothic, dark, pop, guitar solos (classic in style and much more present compared to the past) and '80s vocalizations/high notes, it's a real treat in the house of horrors of Type O Negative, where the atmosphere is always wonderfully "creepy" and unhealthy.

Another point in favor is that in many moments you sense a sound extremely similar to that of the album "II" by the splendid Down, and it’s no coincidence that TON (re)draw from the sludge/doom also of Crowbar (another unjustly underestimated band linked to Down), where the common denominator is always and still Black Sabbath.

Regarding the historical importance and value of TON, certainly one of their greatest merits has been to lighten and make more accessible a challenging genre like doom, having brought it to the top of the rock/metal charts thanks to their talent, intuition, and taste in having tempered it with gothic atmospheres and very catchy melodies bordering on pop that have captured the hearts of many girls. To note, in this regard, the presence of Tara VanFlower from Lycia as a guest vocalist in "Halloween in Heaven." An album made of citations (or self-citations), but not without truly valid songs destined to become other classics in their repertoire: a mixture perhaps a bit confusing and excessive (also due to the long average duration of each song), but really beautiful and after all Sabbath-like to the core. And neither the bastard sarcasm that has distinguished them is missing, so there's no need to worry because their personality is always present.

This time TON have hit a good mark, perhaps managing to reconcile both followers of apocalyptic sounds and listeners of more immediate and less oppressive gothic sounds.