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Idensity: Chronicles
19/12/13 || Ironpants
“The problem of keeping your promises”
The French band Idensity has put some effort in the work of promoting this album with a teaser clip in social medias, and has also put up some clips from the recording sessions on their YouTube-channel. And to be honest with you, I got a little excited from what I saw (and heard), because the style presented in the teaser from the song ‘Chronicles’ came from the areas of symphonic death metal that appeals to my personal desires. I said to myself, “This should be pretty sweet”, but I would very soon regret my words.
As I understand it, this is Idensity’s second album, and at first, it is indeed interesting. The album gets a good start with above mentioned song, some blast beats, majestic orchestral parts and some opera singing, some clean singing and a violin. Yes, they have a full time violin player that sets them apart from other bands a little bit. But say the joy that lasts…
Rather quickly I lose interest in the music presented, and there are several factors that are so wrong with the musical content that I get a bit frustrated. Even if there’s nothing really wrong with the album regarding sound and production, in courtesy of Mr. Dan Swanö, it is quite sterile and stiff. For instance the drums used are some kind of digital kit, and you can get away with that if you use the correct sound library, but if you combine the fact that you have a really tight drummer, with the wrong kind of sound settings, it sounds like a drum machine. There is software on the market that can counteract such a dilemma, please use them for a better experience. If you see it from the drummers side, it’s not very often you get criticism for being too tight, right? See it as a free tip to alter your playing style and/or choice of drum kit.
Also, the choice of tempo in almost all of the songs besides “Chronicles” is in mid-tempo, bordering to slow tempo, and together with the sound picture and earlier mentioned stiff drums it gets really boring to listen through the whole album. I lose interest and my thoughts wander off to more important matters. So if you want to attract at least me, you have to get some action going. More songs in the veins of “Chronicles” would have pushed this record to another level.
The orchestral parts that are spread out through the whole album is allowed to take over in almost every song, which is OK if they would have been full blown orchestral parts, but most often they are rather thin and only really works together with the other instruments of the band. When alone the orchestral parts become tedious pauses that slow down the album to much instead of pushing them forward.
I can’t really put them down either, because they are doing almost everything right, they want to put together a majestic production and connect it to a storyline handling different gods and religions, such as “Islam” and “Loki”. They have even put down a song called “Annunaki”, so I guess the lyricist have been reading up on his facts. There is no outer worldly experience in the end though, which is kinda sad.
Well, I’ve heard worse and most definitely, I’ve heard better. Idensity have the potential to be much better than this, and the main factor here is that they don’t have the means to perform it as grand as they want it to be, I guess it sounded better inside the composers head than it does on the album? If they put some focus on song structures and a more diverse environment regarding tempos and incorporate more nuances to their compositions they could most surely return with full strength and kick me in the nuts
- Information
- Released: 2013
- Label: Send The Wood Music
- Website: www.idensity-metal.com/
- Band
- Christophe Ferreira: vocals
- Antoine Leboisselier: rhythm guitar
- Alain Arcidiacono: lead guitar
- Mathieu Jarrot: bass
- Mayline Gautié: violin
- Jean-Philippe Ouamer: drums
- Tracklist
- 01. Chronicles
- 02. Over the abyss
- 03. Sekhmet
- 04. Mófa
- 05. The seven seals
- 06. Antikhristos
- 07. Typhon
- 08. Islam
- 09. Annunaki
- 10. Mantra
- 11. Loki
