A bit late, but no thread on it.
What does everybody think of the first album with the new singer? Personally, I reckon it's a masterpiece.
The Poet and the Pendulum is 14 minutes long, but seriously awesome. Based on an Edgar Allan Poe short story. It feels like an entire film score, condensed.
Bye Bye Beautiful (the 3rd single) and Master Passion Greed are about as subtle as your average ned - slamming into respectively their former singer and her husband - but both pretty damn good. Mostly male vocals on the latter, interestingly. Bye Bye Beautiful is this album's I Wish I Had An Angel, but better.
Amaranth comes across as a poor man's Nemo, but I still want to dance every time I hear it.
Sahara and Cadence of Her Last Breath are quite slow, and the album lowlights, but still pretty good.
Eva is this album's Sleeping Sun, and very touching, though entirely the
wrong song with which to showcase the new singer's vocals. The Heart I Once Had looks like it's going the same way, with touchingly slow verses, but Amaranth-esque choruses. It's still a touching song about a miscarriage though. Album closer Meadows of Heaven does go down the same route, but is far more protracted and the choir have been given free reign to warble as they please, it would seem. It works fantastically well.
Whoever Brings the Night is...bizarre, but brilliant.
The Islander is an acoustic track made pre-Nightwish. Believe it or not the band were originally going to make all their songs in that vein. It's fine as a one off, but I'm glad they didn't go down that route.
Last of the Wilds is instrumental, like Oceanborn's Moondance, but while there was an eastern European feel to the latter, Celtic influences run through this. If they'd said it had been made for a new extended version of Braveheart I'd have honestly believed them.
7 Days to the Wolves is another male/female combo track, and works very well, though it is quite slow.
The question is, is the new singer any good? I say yes without question. She's a rock singer who can do opera (Tarja was the opposite) but that works. So so much has gone into this album, and with each listen I'm picking up new nuances. Truly a wonderful album, and well worth the wait!
I can't wait to see them live again.
