Raintime

Flies And Lies

Written by: TL on 25/07/2007 01:02:17

Italian power-metallers Raintime are yet another one of those bands who will probably mean the world to you if you're into the genre, and just about nothing at all if you're not. The reason I'm telling you this is of course that the guys have released a new album called "Flies & Lies", I'm reviewing it, and as it has almost become tradition, I'm so urging to get into telling you what it sounds like that I'm quite content with bullshitting my way through a poor excuse for an introduction. Thus let the first paragraph be ended and let us get down to business.

Now the band is labeled as an extreme power metal band, but from what I'm hearing on their second full length "Flies & Lies", I feel the term symphonic is missing somewhere in the description. They have guitar-hooks and clean vocal styles that lean heavily on In Flames, as mainly displayed in the choruses. The verses are typically dominated by death metal screams and more sinister fretwork while everything is constantly being made sparkly and power-ish by synths/keyboard-work you could have sworn you heard from Nightwish. It really feels like it's two styles coming together on every song, with one being the fast paced ballsy death metal and the other being the hook-filled overly melodic and dramatic power metal.

To begin with, it all sounds very well, but within a short while you'll notice the first problems. You see on this record it's like a battle is taking place between the two earlier mentioned sides of the band, and as advantage switches from song to song, it becomes increasingly clear that the sound you feel like cheering for is the darker and more death metal one. Songs like "Apeiron", "Finally Me" and the opening title track just seem a bit too anthemic and melodic and the clean vocals start annoying you, when focus is kept on them too long, because of their too obvious attempts at being catchy. Tracks like "Rolling Chances" and "Rainbringer" on the other hand work way better, as they are driven by the darker and faster elements, while the symphonic power-elements only serve as characterizing spice-effects added to the songs. It simply feels more credible when the attempts at epicism are kept in check by the plain old bone-crushing forces of aggressive metal.

Now I was tilting between what to grade this album, because while there are definitely better and more interesting metal acts out there with a similar style, there's also a lot of promising stuff on "Flies And Lies" that justify credit. But then again all I have to do is ask myself: "Did we really need a bad death/power-metal cover of Michael Jackson's Beat It?".

Download: Rolling Chances, Rainbringer,
For the fans of: In Flames, Nightwish, Iron Maiden, Deadlock
Listen: MySpace

Release Date 28.05.2007
Lifeforce Records
Provided by Target ApS

Related Items | How we score?
Comments
comments powered by Disqus

Legal

© Copyright MMXXIV Rockfreaks.net.