German symphonic power/gothic band Xandria have been in the scene for almost thirty years now. Led by mastermind Marco Heubaum, only remaining founding member through many line-up changes, this is band’s eighth full opus, first one in six years with completely new line-up. New singer Ambre Vourvahis sounds really convincing with her strong and melodic voice, and her interplay with Marco’s growled and almost black metal screamed voice comes to front in songs like awesome ‘You Will Never Be Our God’, featuring guest performance by Ralf Scheepers of Primal Fear/Gamma Ray fame, being one of my personal favorites on this one. This brand of symphonic melodic gothic/power metal didn’t always sit with me well in the past, but this band always somehow was good and they continue that way. Choirs and symphonic orchestrated parts are epic, bombastic and band is still metal besides that and guitars and their melodies lead the way through soundscape of music which opens up and touches you most inner feelings and fights and struggles. Songs that I can also list as my favorites are: ‘Ghosts’, ‘Your Stories I’ll Remember’.
Say what you will, or what you want, but Anti-Flag continue to release great albums for decades now. Pittsburgh punk rockers are back with new batch of songs, to be correct kind of intro and ten songs and they are needed now more than ever. War in Ukraine, produced mass economic crisis and recession, poverty and great rift between rich and poor having nothing to eat, rising tide of right wing and fascist populism throughout Eastern and now Western Europe too, those are all themes just ripe for singing along. You will say, melodic punk preaches to the converted, because who will listen to Anti-Flag? Punks, mainly. But, those themes are never to be forgotten and need to be addressed and that makes us think about what is important in life. Anti-Flag have quite a lot of guest performers on this album. My personal favorite songs on this one are hard to pick, but I will try: ‘Modern Metamedicine’ with guest performance by Jesse Leach of Killswitch Engage, ‘The Fight Of Our Lives’ featuring Tim McIlrath of Rise Against, ‘NVREVR’ featuring Stacey Dee of Bad Cop/Bad Cop, but all songs are fantastic. Justin and Chris No 2 interplay with their vocals and band delves mainly in mid tempo melodic waters but there are occasional excursions into more faster, aggressive hardcore punk waters. Great album, long awaited, but the wait was worth it.
Melodic/pop punk legends New Found Glory released new acoustic album with Revelation Records. These legends made some milestone albums, covered soundtrack songs in punk versions, and now it is time for most personal acoustic album which contains 7 new songs and 7 renditions of old classics. I will concentrate on new songs here because I think this is the most personal work to date, due to serious illness of one of the band members. These songs are full of hope, full of wishing to get healthy again, yet remaining in mind that battle might be lost. Songs like ‘Get Me Home’ and especially ‘Watch The Lilies Grow’ brought goosebumps and tears to my eyes, because I am currently also ill and sometimes see no way out if and it eats me down and there are better days, but also bad days too. But, never lose hope and never lose the will to fight and love like ‘Kiss The Floor’ says. This album is full of love, hope, most heartfelt personal emotions and lyrics, so I love every single minute of it.
KRAYKULLA-WEBZINE 