The Wake - Ode To Misery
Spinefarm

Tormentor Erich: With ‘Ode To Misery’ the Finnish Spinefarm Records presents us a new band from their country. The Wake started in 1998 as Bleeding Harmony and after some demos and line up changes they recorded this first full-length album (41 minutes) last spring. I don’t know why the release took so long, but now it is here and fans of melodic thrash/death metal can give this album a try.

The Wake presents ten songs that can be described as Arch Enemy meets Hypocrisy and Callenish Circle. You want a track with a lot of variety and melodic guitars? Try ‘Deep Silent Dead’. You want fast thrash metal? Try ‘Like A Fallen Angel’. All other songs can be compared more or less to these two examples. The four guys write songs that are catchy (but not too commercial), and on the other hand so full of breaks and melodies that you still need some time to let the album develop itself to you. Very positive is the guitar playing by Jani Luttinen and Sakari Lempinen. They are very active but they also play like the break is still a bit on. I know a lot of people who like this sort of ‘controlled played music’, but for me personally it spoils the fun a bit. I keep thinking “It could still have been a bit better”. Listen to ‘The Neverending’ great solo, but also a bit too straightforward song. It’s like they want to do some astonishing things (also in the writing) but they don’t dare to do it yet for 100 %. Ok, I admit that this sounds maybe a bit whining, but I just cannot help it. So far so good, but we are not done here. Unfortunately I have to spotlight singer (and bass player) Kaj Michelsson. His voice is the one thing on this album that is only real irritating. Kaj uses this gggrraa ggraa ggrrewww hoarse screaming voice and it is not powerful enough to convince at every single song when this album is played for the whole 41 minutes. Why not sing with a firm low voice? Or even a normal voice? Too bad, especially when you take in consideration that the drum parts by Wellu Helenius fit the songs well, and this also counts for the powerful production. The lyrics are sometimes very dark, although love seems to be a mean topic. Let’s just say that the way of writing is typical Scandinavian, and I bet that there is some gothic influence here as well.

So in the end this ‘Ode To Misery’ is surely an OK album, but nagging as we reviewers are I still cannot cope with the vocals, and therefore it will not be voted as a very good album.

Rating: 67/100 (details)

http://www.the-wake.com