Anathema

I had always thought of Anathema as a melodic heavy metal band and I approached this looking to hear more of the same but this is quite different to anything I have heard from them before – searching, expansive and almost prog-like in its sound and style.

The Cavanagh brothers together with friends and allies (notably Steven Wilson who mixed the album) have combined to make music that is fresh, new and should appeal to anyone whose musical sensibilities are greater than riff and rhythm alone. Which is not to say that this is devoid of either, it is just much more than that.

The music is loaded with vaulting vocals, keyboards and deeply meaningful lyrics, treatise’ on the reasons for existence and interactions between the human soul and the earth but it is delivered with power and sensitivity in equal measure. you can feel the musical maturity of a band that have had time to look at their place in this world and develop their ideas properly.
In other hands this might have been an overblown and over-produced supertanker of an album but – and I feel the creative touch of Steven Wilson here – there is still a feeling of the music being developed before your very ears.

Check out 'Summernight Horizon’ and 'Angels Walk Among Us’ or the magnificent 'Universalfor examples of the best of the album but try to listen to it as a total piece and at a volume level that blocks out anything else so that you can get completely within the music – for once it is worth it.