Label: Napalm Records
Release date: 8/21/2020
Production: Andrew Kingsley
Album length: 55.56 min
Genre: Power Metal
Power metal might not be the first genre that comes to mind when you think of Canada, but the fact is that one of the hottest bands in the style right now comes from exactly there. British Columbia, to be precise. The band was founded back in 2007 by singer Brittney Slayes (real surname Hayes) and her boyfriend, drummer Scott Buchanan, and over the following years they recorded three studio albums that didn’t exactly stand out, neither for her voice nor for the originality of the music. And then Apex happened – the fourth album, which launched the band among the stars and toward the top of all the metal charts. A concept album that finally showed what the band is capable of, it brought a seriously fresh breeze to power metal waters that are typically ruled by Swedish and German acts. With an album that good, the question naturally comes up – can UtA match or maybe even top Apex with the new one?
The answer is yes! The album kicks off with the intro track “Waking Dream”, which slowly builds in intensity and momentum and flows perfectly into the title track “Abyss”. With its keyboard runs and infectious guitar melodies, it gets under your skin in an instant and turns into the hard-hitting song the album is proudly named after. “Through Stars”, which follows, slows the tempo down a notch, since it’s a ballad with a big nod to the eighties sound that would sound seriously good in some huge stadium in front of a crowd of thousands. But the album’s variety doesn’t end there, and here comes “Legacy” – a song that feels like a tribute to their fellow Canadian Devin Townsend; sci-fi keyboards and a wall of sound, as if they wanted to summon Ziltoid himself onto their album. Slightly progressive rhythms, a fantastic guitar solo and mighty choruses backed by backing vocals further conjure up the feeling of traveling through the endless expanse of space.
“Return to Me” could be described as a mix of power and melodic death metal. Besides clean vocals, UtA also use the growls of guitarist Grant Truesdell, who contrasts her vocally and adds yet another unique direction to the band. This perhaps unusual mix continues with “Soulbound”, which in places, in the combination of keyboards and guitars, even recalls Wintersun. “Faster Than Light”, with its Dragonforce-style intro, is as fast as its title suggests and proves the band is brilliantly tight, be it Buchanan’s drumming or the Truesdell/Kingsley soloing, while Brittney hits the highest registers of her voice at one point. Next comes the eight-minute epic highlight “The Wind That Shapes the Land”. It starts with a slow acoustic intro, and before long the atmosphere shifts into classic power metal rhythms, a duel of clean and growled vocals, progressive solos, synth parts and mood swings that the music follows faithfully. The second-to-last track, “Carry the Flame”, slows the pace and strolls toward the album’s big finale in a proper AOR groove. This time Andrew shows that besides the guitar he’s also got a great handle on his vocals, which complement Brittney’s superbly. The album closes with the epic “Afterlife”. So many musical ideas are woven together in it that, if it weren’t pulled off the way it is, it could have come out as a stale mess. But it doesn’t. It’s a masterful interweaving of power and melodeath with orchestral parts added by Francesco Ferrini (Fleshgod Apocalypse) and a chorus that wouldn’t be out of place even at an Iron Maiden show.
Unleash the Archers did it. In the middle of this Covid-19 madness, they managed to record and deliver an outstanding album that more than deserves its place on the power metal throne. A great conceptual story that began on Apex (the band is thinking about releasing a comic with the whole story), excellent production, variety and musical perfection put “Abyss” right at the top of this year’s album releases.
9.5/10
Tracklist:
- Waking Dream
- Abyss
- Through Stars
- Legacy
- Return To Me
- Soulbound
- Faster Than Light
- The Wind That Shapes the Land
- Carry the Flame
- Afterlife
Lineup:
Brittney Slayes – vocals
Grant Truesdell – guitar, vocals
Andrew Kingsley – guitar, vocals, synth, production
Scott Buchanan – drums
Guests:
Benjamin Arscott – bass guitar
Francesco Ferrini – orchestral arrangements
Jacob Hansen – engineering, mixing, mastering
