myGRAIN: Orbit Dance (2006)

www.myspace.com/mygrain

www.mygrain1.com

Genre: Melodic Death Metal

Track List

Plastic (3:43)

Cold Reflection (3:59)

W.I.F (3:51)

Pitch-Black (4:05)

Darkbound (3:59)

Humanimal (3:51)

Misery Assembly Line (4:11)

Downfall (4:06)

Orbit Dance (4:24)

Veil of Sun (4:08)

Hollowgram (4:20)

Overview

Having covered some of the larger acts in metal, I thought I’d now start taking the chance to introduce you to some of the lesser known names. As is often the case in metal sometimes it is the virtually unknown bands who turn out to be your favourites. Orbit Dance is the debut album from Finnish band myGRAIN, a band I am really fond of but don’t really get much recognition. I’ve always found that rather odd, as they really are very talented, and are even signed to a very large record label (Spinefarm). They are easily identified by their strong use of rhythm guitar and background synth, as well as Tommy’s use of clean and growled vocals. As a relatively new band with large potential this album provides a fantastic platform to build on, as well as the oppotunity to continuing developing their own sound (as can be seen with their second album Signs of Existence).

Highlights

The intro song – Plastic, is one I absolutely love.  I can remember when I first listened to this album as soon as the beginning of this song started I knew that I would love this band. It’s high tempo is offset by some typical mixed vocals and even a mini solo (something of a rarity for a myGRAIN song), laying down a fearsome pace and a big act for the other songs to follow. I find it quite hard to explain to explain why I like this song so much, as it has few qualities that you can easily point to and say ‘this is what makes this song great’, and yet what is there seems to work perfectly. My other favourite song on this album, Hollowgram, follows in a similar vein with high tempo and mostly growled vocals. The main difference with this one is a much more noticable role played by the synth, at first in the background before emerging to the front towards the end. As emo as this sounds, the end of this song makes me want to cry every time I hear it, and it’s the only song that has that effect on me, so it’s gotta get some credit for being able to evoke real emotion in the listener.

One feature of this album is that many of the songs that aren’t great are still strong by their own rights, including W.I.F, Darkbound, Misery Assembly Line, Downfall, Orbit Dance and Veil of Sun. W.I.F and Misery Assembly Line have some seriously heavy riffing, with W.I.F having probably the heaviest instrumental work on the album. Both make a good listen, with Misery Assembly Line throwing in some nice clean vocal sections. Veil of Sun is similar in it’s style to Misery Assembly Line, but also features a strong synth most notably at the beginning. Darkbound is another track that is driven by the synth, and is possibly one of the best tracks on the album for blending into all of the instruments into an enjoyable harmony.

Orbit Dance features an ear-catching beginning, with a great riff followed by some really atmospheric synth. The rest of the song is good, but doesn’t really live up to what the beginning promises. Downfall is the same but to a more extreme extent – the introduction is one of my favourites in any song ever, with the slow build up giving way to some blazing guitar and great vocals. However, the rest of the song, while not bad, feels a little poorly constructed with some big, sudden changes in guitar rhythm and vocals interrupting the flow significantly. Both of these songs are still strong, but could have been really something with a bit more thought.

Lowlights

Cold Reflection starts with a really promising drum section that is repeated at points throughout the song, and is the only part of the album where DJ Locomotive (drums) gets to show off some of his skills. The rest of the song is comprised of some heavy riffing and slower, cleanly sung sections, the rhythm guitar being by far the standout performer once the song gets going. What causes it to end up in the lowlights section is that I feel the vocals aren’t great on this song (notably the clean ones) which ultimately achieve something similar to what occurs in Downfall, interrupting the flow of the song. Unfortunately, Cold Reflection does not have Downfall’s brilliant opening to counter this.

The other two I’d like to mention are Pitch-Black and Humanimal.Pitch-Black is very different to the other songs, beginning with a slow and drawn out synth piece and using a very different style of rhythm guitar to the other tracks. It concentrates on what I believe are lots of middle frets, whereas the rest of the tracks are comprised almost entirely of the upper frets. It makes for a change, but looks quite out of place. Humanimal begins on a very heavy note but then very suddenly switches whenever the vocals are introduced, before going back whenever they stop. It’s just not very well put together, and is definately the weakest track on the album.

Conclusion

The word to sum up this album is atmosphere. It creates it brilliantly via the use of the synthesizer, and the rhythm guitar fits in with this perfectly. The blend they achieve is quite something, and Tommy’s vocals are strong as well, although more so on the growled ones than the clean ones. Nearly all the songs are really good, a couple are great and all of them are listenable. It is without a shadow of a doubt the best debut album I have ever heard and one of my personal favourite albums ever – very few albums out there have such consistent quality throughout. Unfortunately there are no video singles from this album, but that shouldn’t stop you giving them at least a quick look on youtube for some examples of their work. The band’s third album has been mooted by some of their members on their site’s forum as a 2010 release, and shall certainly be one of the things I look foward to most in the year to come.

Rating: 10/10

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~ by chrisaxe on December 29, 2009.