IN GRIEF

The music on the album is semi-progressive and melodic death metal with keyboards. Although In Grief are Norwegian they sound very Finnish to me because it's acts like Amorphis and Swallow the Sun that I'm reminded of when listening to "Deserted Soul". The music is slow, doomy, epic and melodic with deep growling vocals and occasional clean vocals (which remind me of the clean vocals featured on some of Enslaved's music). While the keyboards play an important role in the music I wouldn't call them dominant. They are rather tastefully placed in the mix and provide the music with a majestic atmosphere.

The album features 7 tracks. The atmospheric and epic keyboard driven intro "Darkening Horizon" sets the tone from the beginning and when "I Am" starts and guitars, drums and bass are added, the overall music style is quickly revealed and there are only few surprises from then on out. All tracks except the intro are between 6 and 9 minutes long. "Deserted Soul" is well produced and maybe a bit more raw and brutal sounding than the above mentioned acts, but still in the polished end of the death metal scale. The band are skilled musicians and the songwriting is generally of high class so all in all a 3.5 star rating (70%) isn't all wrong. A very strong debut release by In Grief. They can be proud of this one.

After the somewhat generic intro track and a half... yes folks you heard it, the band doesn't actually kick into action until 1,5 minutes into the album's second track. This have probably not been a problem have this album not been only 7 tracks long!

I Am is an ok opener that goes though the routines of introducing In Grief and their style but manages to leave out the composition prowess for later. There are minor hints of Power Metal in a few sections but I find this surprisingly enough not problematic. Let's move on shall we? Invited War starts with the expanded intro section depicting a scene from the middle-eastern war conflict and the song quickly picks up the pace with its melodic death metal instrumental section. This is where I finally see the band coming into their own, even though the lyrical content of the composition sounds very unconvincing coming from a young Norwegian collective. Modern Truth maintains the melodic instrumental edge of Invited War but overdoes it a bit by sounding too much like a potential single.

The album's title track is where In Grief finally starts showing their progressive chops and it suddenly becomes clear how good this album might have been if only the band had spread out these progressive tendencies throughout the rest of the release. In The End progresses the music in a satisfactory fashion without necessarily adding anything new to the band's overall sound, which is a pity seeing that its the second longest piece of music here. Luckily, Weak turns out too be a strong album closer (who could have guessed?) that returns the band to the frame of mind that I acknowledged on the album's title track. The final few minutes are easily the best this record has to offer and actually leaves me screaming for more!

The general feeling I get from listening to Deserted Soul is a very mixed one. There is definitely a great deal of potential hidden within the collective but it will probably take a few more releases before we'll get anything really substantial here. Having said that, it still wouldn't be completely impossible for In Grief to deliver a real genre masterpiece in a few years time.

***** star songs: Deserted Soul (6:13) Weak (9:45)

**** star songs: Invited War (6:38) In the End (8:21)

*** star songs: Darkening Horizon (2:19) I Am (7:15) Modern Truth (6:50)