Grand Illusion

Yet another release that shows power metal groups to be abandoning patterned songwriting and reliance upon rolling kick drums to power the music, “Grand Illusion” stands as the most mature, accessible album of Nocturnal Rites’ tenure of metal vocation.

In terms of overall ambience, “Grand Illusion” is much keener on hard rock sensibilities than the group’s April 2004 effort, “New World Messiah.” These Swedes welcome long-established metal influences into the structures of their songwriting in an approach that is especially similar to the current musical path of Stratovarius. In toning down the more aggressive, faster-paced material and focusing on a wider scope of sonic emotions, the band’s songs carry much more profundity and dynamics than on any of the band’s prior releases.

Wizened listeners will find the intricate harmonies displayed on tracks such as the churning, restless “Something” to be particularly of curiosity, while younger fans will be prone to connect with the Children Of Bodom-ish riffing that forms the theme of “Never Trust”, a song that will give fans an idea of what Bodom might sound like if Alexi Laiho adopted the more traditional vocal style of Nocturnal Rites singer Jonny Lindqvist.

Speaking of vocals, Lindqvist truly excels throughout Grand Illusion.” His vocals are duly dominant and deeply impassionate all through the mid-tempo pounder that kicks the entire affair off, “Fools Never Die.” Lindqvist is an impressive singer in terms of range and control and on this record; the vocalist approaches his performance with clout during “Still Alive”, a song that stands out as the album’s best overall cut. Crisp, edgy guitars meet soaring melodies on this cut, a song that will be found to be appealing by fans of Metallica as well as Dream Theater.

Likewise, the ear-catching anthem “Something Undefined” should find a broad appeal, with a highly memorable chorus and a degree of commercial likeability that should result in considerable attention from rock-oriented Program Directors and multitudes of fans of melodic heavy metal alike. Ripping solos by lead guitarist Nils Norberg place an exclamation point on the sheer impressiveness of this particular track.

Nocturnal Rites does have a dark side about them, most particularly revealed in the majestic yet devilish “Cuts Like A Knife.” Wicked growling vocals during the chorus section, provided by Kristoffer W. Olivius (Naglfar) enhance the song’s overall impact, measuring up as one of the more intense pieces that you’ll find here. The track is richly articulate, with further acrobatics guitar-wise giving the track an eerie tone.

Metal fans that prefer the music of Dio and Yngwie Malmsteen will notice that Nocturnal Rites pushes that type of songwriting even further, modernizing a classic sound for a new age of metal. Those that have doubted to vocal power of Lindqvist must only check out “End Of Our Rope” to realize the evidence of his vocal strength. Flurries of sweeping guitar runs prepare the listener for a highly epic hook that takes this track to coda, a fine segue into more traditional power metal territory, “Never Ending”, a piece that will be met with fans of the band’s older works with a warm welcome.

European audiences have already discovered this tremendous effort and as the time nears for this fantastic recording’s American release, fans can rest assured that Nocturnal Rites will be a name spoken often in heavy metal circles in 2006.

Not long after pumping out the solid, yet slightly progressive "New World Messiah", NR succeeded once again in capturing the more aggressive side of the power metal genre. The best way I can describe this release is as a rather clever hybrid of the power and melody of "Shadowland", and the darkness and heaviness of "Afterlife".

Tracks such as "Fools Never Die", "Still Alive" and "End of Our Rope" have very straight-forward structures and focus primarily on aggressive riffs and rebellious lyrics. Unlike the tone of songs such as "Against the World" off the previous release, these lyrics give the rebel much more strength in his fight and give him the edge against his enemies.

Other tracks such as "Never Trust" and "Cuts like a Knife" are something of a departure for the newer NR sound. The former has a synthesized intro similar to "Revelation" off of Shadowland, but the guitar and keyboard solo section is loaded with dueling leads, reminding more of the earlier days of "Tales of Mystery and Imagination". The latter has some highly dark vocals done by a guest singer, a route taken recently by acts including Kamelot, Dragonforce, and Freedom Call.

Most of the rest of the tracks on this album are geared heavily towards memorable choruses, crushing riffs, and a good amount of atmospheric devices. Of these, "Our Wasted Days" and "Never Ending" are stand outs, particularly for their choruses.

In conclusion, this is definately worthy of fans of NR, both new and old. It sees some controlled evolution, but still an emphasis on the strengths of the band. Nils Norberg is aided on this album by some guest soloists, which give some of the songs on here a good deal of variety during their lead sections. I was thoroughly pleases with this release, especially considering the short amount of time between it's release and that of NWM.

New album from one of the best melodic Heavy Power Metal bands in the scene worldwide. NOCTURNAL RITES, without ever being the super name in their genre they have always managed to be there with pride. "Grand Illusion" is the logical next step in their career. Mature music with excellent performing and production, in a work that shows a band that although it has been so many years in the scene, still has the same freshness as in their first release. It is really a pity that this band never got the recognition it really deserved as on of the best metal acts but maybe this is the good point here. Without this weight on their shoulders they continue to do what they always have done, something that sometimes many bands find it hard when they seem to hold the hopes of a genre in their hands. Without many words NOCTURNAL RITES never claimed to be on top although they ought to.
Anyway let's get to the album now. The music is as always full of melody and passion but also powerful and strong. All these of course are covered with an excellent voice that gives a big plus to the whole result. Songs like "Never Trust" and "Our Wasted Days" have everything that is needed for a track to be stuck in your mind for a long time, and this from the very first listening. The "blend" of the keyboards with the melodic guitars gives an excellent result to the sound of the CDIf you don't know NOCTURNAL RITES I think that it is time to get familiar with them. Don't waste any more time with the so called "great new coming" bands that has so many to offer to the music.

Nocturnal Rites did disappoint me a little bit with last year’s”New World Messiah”. They had been releasing two great albums, and then did that one, clearly a step down. And now’s the 2005 release here, and it took some listens, and then I started to like it more, but after some more listens some songs of the the album did really grow to the weaker again. And in overall, compared to “Afterlife” and “Shadowland”, this album isn’t even close.

What we’re talking about here is still melodic metal with ultra-melodic choruses. That’s the album’s weak point anyway, most of the choruses are a little bit too poppy, but everything else is pretty cool here and there. Pretty much all riffs and solos and such are kick ass again, the production is much better than last time, in some parts. Especially the drumsound and also Jonny’s vocals are awesome (like always) but I still think there’s some problem with the production, which I will discuss at the end. So what songs do we have here ?

Well, we both have some mid-tempo and some fast ones, like always with Nocturnal Rites. No song does really stand out as more diverse than others except one song, which probably is among the best songs NR have written, titled “Cuts Like A Knife”. This is a song that shows that the band can sound heavy, and that they are so much better without all those sissy keyboards they have started to use too much. The song is a heavy stomping mid-tempo, quite similiar with Kamelot’s “March of Mephisto”, but this one’s better. They also have Naglfar’s vocalist on here, doing some slightly more aggressive vocals, which actually are great, spices it up a bit. The song also has a kickass crazy solo, which by the way is a thing Nisse could have done more often on this album, some crazy guitarsolos, I know he can do them. We have other songs too or ? Yeah, another song I think is great is “Our Wasted Days”, moderately fast and actually with a nice chorus (very rare thing on this CD!), also a nice solo on here. Sadly, these two mentioned songs are the only “highlights”. There are some passages here and there in almost every song that are good (except “End of Our Rope” that sucks through the whole song). Mostly the verses are good, like in “Fools Never Die, “Something Undefined”, “Never Ending” (great verses, actually!), One by One. And then there’s three songs that just are plain boring ones, “End of Our Rope”, “Still Alive” and “Never Trust”, just meh. None of these later mentioned songs has good choruses, really sad, and NR has to work harder on that until next album !

So, what this album lacks is mostly two things, I’d say two very important things in NR’s music - melodies and production. I say this, compare the chorus of “Invicible” with, for example “Still Alive”, and you will know what i’m talking about. The choruses of this album feels very stressed, like the guys didn’t have time to write anything better, because I know they can do better than this, they’ve shown it before. And production wise, they’ve really fixed the drumsound to the better for this album. But the rest ? Where the hell is the guitars ? Yes, somewhere way back in there you can find them. I saw the DVD that followed with my Lmtd. Edition, and Fredrik does some serious raw and heavy riffing in a part there, and I am like, why the hell doesn’t the guys lift that guitarsound more forward in the mix ? It’s sad, the guitarplayers has bands like Kreator and Pantera as favourite bands. Why don’t get a raw guitar sound, put it higher in the mix, Jonny on vocals and great melodies like before, and then Nocturnal Rites could be a killer band again...thing is that I think NR has lost their throne on being “the best Umeå band”, the band PERSUADER has shown with their first two albums that they are greater and has more and better ideas. “Grand Illusion” is not bad, it’s not great, it’s just damn generic and lacks good melodies. Hopefully NR can make a better album next time.

3 best songs: Cuts Like A Knife, Our Wasted Days, Never Ending