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Apocalyptica > 7th Symphony > 2010, Digital, Sony Music > Reviews
Apocalyptica - 7th Symphony

Apocalyptica has become quite a different beast... - 80%

rizzodecloptunne, December 3rd, 2010

Since Apocalyptica released Amplified, they have markedly changed their sound. Vocalist collaborations have been (over)featured, cutting out some of the more interesting instrumental tracks. While this style is not for everyone, Apocalyptica has adapted to it. This album, however, does take a step up from Worlds Collide.

Overall, I felt the vocal tracks on this album were much more consistent with the feel of the album (not necessarily the style). Everything here felt darker and more emotionally charged than most songs on previous albums, including the vocal tracks. Compare a song like I'm Not Jesus to the rest of Worlds Collide, versus a song like Not Strong Enough to the rest of 7th Symphony. Two drastically different vibes. Though the vocal tracks do seem to be more tailor-made for the radio, they seem to get an excessive amount of frack from fans of the band, and while their instrumentals are better, the vocal tracks on 7th Symphony at least meshed better with the rest of the album.

This is not to say that vocal tracks did not detract from the album. I have been a fan of Apocalyptica since I picked up Inquisition Symphony a long time ago, and watching the evolution into a more radio-oriented band has disturbed me, much in the way Metallica's change to Alternica disturbed the metal world (oh dear, the similarities...). I feel the integration of vocal tracks into the album ruins the flow to a certain extent (even if this album flowed better than Worlds Collide), and ultimately it made 7th Symphony a bit of a difficult listen. That being said, I am a fan of some of the vocal tracks on this album, moreso than previous albums, notably Not Strong Enough and Bring Them To Light, though these would function much better as singles released separately from the album.

Comments on the vocals aside, the instrumental tracks on this album simply blew my mind. As a cellist and metalhead myself, I was content with their previous crossover style, but have always wanted more from the band. Apocalyptica has slowly morphed into a much more solid metal band. Albums like Reflection struck much more of a balance between classical training/writing and metal riffing/song structures, but 7th Symphony shifted that balance more towards riffing, something that feels to me much closer to reinventing the cello than the mix of styles before. From the onset of At The Gates Of Manala through to Shadow of Venus, I felt much more like I was listening to a metal band than I ever did listening to songs like Faraway or even Betrayal. The sheer awesomeness of the instrumentals is what really saved this album for me.

The addition of the live DVD was certainly a treat, though Tipe Johnson was an unnecessary addition to the session. Watching these guys play is simply awe-inspiring to me. It's becoming harder and harder to find string musicians who can really hook into what the Spanish call the don, that extra something that makes the music come alive. These guys have it, and it shows in their live performances. Just get rid of Johnson and it would have been that much more perfect.

Overall, considering the pros and cons of the vocal tracks, the instrumentals blowing my mind, and the live DVD, this album felt like a B-. An A could have been achieved if the band included the vocal tracks on a separate CD or as singles only and incorporated more instrumentals, which I hope they will do on their later albums.

Extremely Hit and Miss - 60%

FullMetalAttorney, November 15th, 2010

I've been a fan of Apocalyptica for over a decade. I was a bit shocked a couple years ago to hear them on the radio--I never thought they were radio material before. But on their last album, they definitely started to shift toward a more radio-friendly sound, at least on some tracks.

7th Symphony continues that trend, resulting in another schizophrenic album of half Apocalyptica as they were and half Radiopocalyptica.

A few of the instrumentals are strong examples of their old sound, notably opener "At the Gates of Manala" and the best track on the album: another collaboration with drummer Dave Lombardo, simply titled "2010". Some of the other instrumentals are much weaker, and instead of "reinventing the cello" seem to be "this is regular cello" (see "Beautiful"). Even so, that's not such a bad thing in context.

The other half of the album is songs with guest vocalists. These tracks tend to be weaker on this album than the last--the guests have much weaker voices, especially Gavin Rossdale. Brent Smith (Shinedown) and Lacey Mosley (Flyleaf--I have never heard of this band) are slightly better. These vocalists are definitely a step down from Corey Taylor, Till Lindemann, and Cristina Scabbia.

The only vocalist who doesn't get lost in the cello assault (or force the cellos to go soft so you can hear him) is Gojira's Joe Duplantier. "Bring Them to Light" actually manages to be a highlight of the album.

The Verdict: The album is schizophrenic, like Worlds Collide. It's also extremely hit-and-miss, with some really great tracks and some really boring tracks, but not much in between. Still, the good parts are worth hearing.

originally written for http://fullmetalattorney.blogspot.com/

A big loss of identity! - 61%

kluseba, October 6th, 2010

The phenomenon of Apocalyptica is dead. What has been original and unique one decade ago when the band began to reinvent well known metal songs into a classical and symphonical style or when the band made their first entirely acoustic albums which were really intense and profound, has now become a mainstream band which repeats itself. At least, the last albums had still a few very interesting collaborations but that isn't the case on this album.

All the songs with guest singers, a part of "Bring them to light" which is a positive exception but has already been recorded several years ago, sound very commercial and faceless. The worst one is really the pop rock song "Broken pieces" which could be on a "Twilight" movie score. The first single "End of me" is really faceless and boring. "Not strong enough" would have been the better choice but this song is also far away from emotional collaborations like the dreamy and soft "Faraway Vol. 2", the darker and intense "Hope Vol. 2" or the very melancholic "Bittersweet". The band decided to chose mostly some less popular singers from some modern and commercial bands and they lose all their charm and uniqueness by doing this. While collaborations from the past still gave a lot of space to the celli and their unique sound and atmosphere, the new songs are concentrated on some cheesy lyrics and the classical instruments sound like ordinary guitars.

At least the instrumental songs deliver the expected standards. The only negative point is that the drums are more present in most of the songs which destroys their old and unique style somehow. The band only shows its brilliant talent in the songs without or with less drumming and when they take their time to develop epic and intelligent structures somewhere between Mozart and Metallica like they used to do a few years ago. There are four nice songs on the album, two very good and two brilliant ones. The opener "At the gates of Manala" goes more into a metal style and is a little bit too long while "Beautiful" has an original classic and acoustic approach but is way too short. The only really well done songs are in fact the melancholic "Sacra" and the very interesting and fresh sounding bonus track "Throgh Paris in a sportscar" even if the song title makes you think of the modern crap which mostly dominates this album. It's a funny antithesis that this bonus track is one of the most traditional and profound songs on the entire album. The rest of the songs feel like some fillers and are only average stuff.

I must conclude that this album is the weakest one in the complete discography of Apocalyptica. The songs sound too metal during most of the instrumental parts ("2010") and too commercial and boring during their collaboration with guest singers ("Broken pieces" is maybe their worst song ever). One nice collaboration and four interesting instrumental songs save the album and make at least one half quite enjoyable. But overall, this album is still somehow boring. The bonus DVD is very interesting too and shows us that the band can still perform in a very personal and intense mood. I have seen them recently on stage and know that they are still really intense and powerful there.

Let us hope that their next album will not only be based on commercial collaborations and want-to-be metal riff shredding, but on the unique power and creativity which has made this band unique. If they will fail, one of the most dynamical bands risks to become as horrible as pseudo-innovating metal clowns like "Van Canto". Let us pray that those boys go back to their roots or reinvent themselves completely but that they won't chose the commercial and faceless path.

Yet another great one from this guys... - 95%

Young_Metalhead, August 26th, 2010

Many of us fans of this band were kind of excited when we heard about this new realease. Of course the expectation grew when they announced who would be doing the vocals during this album: Gavin Rossdale (better known for his band Bush), Brent Smith (who apparently has plays in a band called Shinedown), Lacey (who sing ins this awful alternative band called Flyleaf) and Joseph Duplantier (yeah! The singer from french band Gojira).

So I just got the Special Edition so that's the one I will be reviewing. The album starts with one of the most amazing songs they have used as an intro. It has everything, the distorted cellos, the classical breaks, the heavy stuff. In one word: EPIC.

The second track was their first single: End of Me, with Gavin Rossdale, it is more like a rock-oriented track, but still powerful, full of emotion, and this guy fits well with the music. The track was written by Eicca and Gavin so it has something from both cello metal and rock. The album keeps kicking your ass during Not Strong Enough, another one with vocals, the vocals style it's kind of generic but this guys managed to make it sound heavy as fuck, and the fucking chorus is catchy as hell...

When 2010 starts to play, you'll notice something: that's Dave Lombardo on drums again!!! And you know this is going to be one of the heaviest moments in the album. It is also one of the tracks with the darkest atmosphere they have written in a while. it kind of reminds me to Betrayal/Forgiveness from the self titled album. The next couple of songs are amazing instrumental and classical shit. Now you understand why the named the album "/th Symphony", because it is a fucking metal symphony!!!

But wait, what's this??? This ugly singing??? Oh yeah, this is one is Lacey, her voice sounds like the average pop/rock singer, but that's like the worst thing here. If vocals on this song were performed by someone else, I'm pretty sure this could have been a 100% score but hey... You can't ask for perfection...

But perfection returned in the next tracks. On the Rooftop with Quasimodo is one of the most beautiful doom tracks they have done in a bunch of time. And then it's time to get heavy! Joseph surely adds the death/thrash bit they needed in order to keep this a fucking amazing piece of art. This is going to be a perfect song for live performances.

Sacra, Rage of Poseidon and The Shadow of Venus are perfect songs designed to make you feel a lot of things, sadness, sorrow, rage... The atmosphere its great in these songs, the riffs, the solos, the cellos!!! My god this fucking guys should be doing more instrumental shit and keep the vocals for bonus tracks. Or maybe inviting more metalheads to sing along them.

After the disaster that Worlds Collide was, they knew what to do, write more symphonies. And even this was ruined by that girl singing like the girl from Paramore, the music, the lyrics, the production, the feeling, everything was in perfect plaece.

If you got the chance give this a listen, you won't regret it. For us fans is harder to review albums, because we always expect a lot more from the bands, las time when Corey Taylor was singing, many of us were dissapointed. This time I'm sure many will be dissapointed becasue of Lacey, but dou you give a damn about a song that's not that bad??? At least it is listeanable...