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Saturday, 05 May 2007 |
For a concept album based around the various mental states of inmates of an asylum, “Asylum 45” certainly sounds cheerful! Holland's Non-Divine present themselves as a highly melodic Heavy Metal band with mild progressive overtones. There's clearly much influence from Metallica (‘Black album' era onwards) in the up-tempo groove-ridden riffs and frontman Ivor van Beek's vocals, although the slightly processed-sounding harmonies that make up many a chorus are more Power Metal than Thrash.
The album opens pretty strongly with “One Man, One Soul”, which is probably the best song overall, moving between latter-day Voivodic Metal and a melodic chorus which could be the result if you made Fear Factory listen to lots of Judas Priest. Songs continue in a similar sort of style, blending into each other (this really is the kind of album you have to listen to a lot if you want to appreciate it) yet having enough differences to keep you alert. Some, such as the Pantera-gone-mellow “New Die-Hard Vampire” do end a little too abruptly just as you're getting into them, and the general song length of three-to-four minutes does not work in the album's favour. There's some variety between the Thrashier likes of “Breathe” and the lighter, almost ballad style of “Sleep”, as well as incorporating an acoustic instrumental, “Love Loss”, showing that the band are making a real effort to be diverse.
If there's a single problem with “Asylum 45”, it's that the production is aimed towards the deep end, making the guitar riffs a wall of noise unless you really concentrate. Make no mistake, this is clearly aimed at the lighter end of the underground rather than the heavier end of the mainstream, but if anything said so far has caused you to turn your Extreme Metal nose up, you probably won't like “Asylum 45”. There are likeable moments - many likeable moments, in fact - but the sad fact is that overall it doesn't live up to the ‘grooving metal madness' promised in the promotional materials, and to stand out in the crowded scene of today you have to go far beyond the call of duty.
Still, Non-Divine are pretty good at what they do, having played live with Anthrax and Ronnie James Dio amongst others. Listen hard enough, and you might even mistake “Asylum 45” for a commercially aimed Devin Townsend album! It could take a while, but these guys have a great deal of potential and given the time may make a masterpiece. In the meantime, here's one that's pretty good to keep you going.
Zadok Day
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