SEARCH
SPONSORED
Login
NEWSLETTER
WHO'S ONLINE
There are 311 unlogged users and 4 registered users online.
You can log-in or register for a user account here.
You can log-in or register for a user account here.
REVIEWS
Buy this album from CD Baby
Into Darkness
Whispers
Black Blood
Race Against the End
Trials
City Falls
Ascension
Our Own Devils
Angels in the Architecture
Endless
Broken Remains
Déjà Vu
RELATED REGEN LINKS
REVIEWS
Eternal Descent
Losing Faith
Incendium Records
Posted: Wednesday, May 07, 2008
By: Trubie Turner
By: Trubie Turner
Eternal Descent's strengths outnumber their weaknesses, but these weaknesses greatly hobble this debut's potential.
The debut album of British gothic metal outfit Eternal Descent, Losing Faith is an anime-inspired concept album that while great in theory, is somewhat lacking in execution. The first noticeable problem is the entire album suffers from a somewhat shoddy sound mix that leaves much of the album's guitar work sounding muted and neutered. However, this isn't always a bad thing because another fault of the album is an abundance of rather sloppy and unnecessary guitar solos. The poor sound mix does help to make some of these solos a bit less grating.
Getting off to a very unimpressive start, the album begins with the generic sounding "Into Darkness" and followed by the equally basic and muffled track "Whispers;" however, "Whispers" stands out more due to a truly terrible vocal performance from vocalist Elysha West. Something strange happens with the track "Black Blood" and what would almost seem like an entirely different vocalist shows up for this track to form a truly lovely and wonderfully put together track. From this point, the album has several written and distinctive highlights such as "Race Against the End" and "City Falls" that, even though accompanied by some of the aforementioned occasional slapdash guitar flourishes, still manage to impress and ingrain themselves upon the listener. Eternal Descent is also capable of composing wonderfully epic anthems as they show in "Angels in the Architecture" and "Déjà Vu," but they also show in the latter that they are also quite capable of ruining these anthems with mistakes such as the vocal performance. Further showcasing the Jekyll and Hyde talent of their singer, the vocals sound more like a Mariah Carey wannabe scream fest. The excellent composition of this track is greatly tarnished by West's unwelcome additions.
Despite the numerous problems with this album, there is obviously a great amount of talent in Eternal Descent. When things align just right and the act is firing on all cylinders, the output is just shy of stunning. However, due to the poor sound mix, hit-and-miss vocals, and some occasionally careless guitar work, the album remains a mild disappointment that is sure to still leave many a listener very optimistic for their next release.
Getting off to a very unimpressive start, the album begins with the generic sounding "Into Darkness" and followed by the equally basic and muffled track "Whispers;" however, "Whispers" stands out more due to a truly terrible vocal performance from vocalist Elysha West. Something strange happens with the track "Black Blood" and what would almost seem like an entirely different vocalist shows up for this track to form a truly lovely and wonderfully put together track. From this point, the album has several written and distinctive highlights such as "Race Against the End" and "City Falls" that, even though accompanied by some of the aforementioned occasional slapdash guitar flourishes, still manage to impress and ingrain themselves upon the listener. Eternal Descent is also capable of composing wonderfully epic anthems as they show in "Angels in the Architecture" and "Déjà Vu," but they also show in the latter that they are also quite capable of ruining these anthems with mistakes such as the vocal performance. Further showcasing the Jekyll and Hyde talent of their singer, the vocals sound more like a Mariah Carey wannabe scream fest. The excellent composition of this track is greatly tarnished by West's unwelcome additions.
Despite the numerous problems with this album, there is obviously a great amount of talent in Eternal Descent. When things align just right and the act is firing on all cylinders, the output is just shy of stunning. However, due to the poor sound mix, hit-and-miss vocals, and some occasionally careless guitar work, the album remains a mild disappointment that is sure to still leave many a listener very optimistic for their next release.
