| CD REVIEW Freakangel |
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Band : Freakangel Hey, this is nice...so now Alfa Matrix is letting us know about their new releases, apparently. Or, well...maybe it was just for this one time, because after all they were asking us to post the fact that the track “God's Blind Game” off this Estonian band's debut album was posted for free download at (http://) soundcloud.com/alfa-matrix/freakangel/gods-blind-game-1. Combining hard electronics with guitar (but not in every song, apparently), the line-up of this band consists of singer Dmitry [whom is also active in ElectroPop act Suicidal Romance (released the 2007 full-length Love Beyond Reach, the 13-track “EP” A Kiss To Resist – it's got quite a bit of re-mixes, see? - and the 2010 full-length Shattered Heart Reflections via Infacted Recordings in Europe – the first also via Gravitor in Russia, and the latter also via Metropolis for the US and via Deathwatch Asia for Japan), had his voice guesting on recent works by Virtual Victim and Preemptive Strike 0.1, and as remixer], guitarist Art, and keyboards handler Frozen (whom most probably also has a sampler to add the couple of female participations), making for a harsh and Industrial sound. A large part of that is due to the real harsh vocals (actually, to some listeners the vocals may be somewhat one-sided and unilateral, and it's therefore a good thing that vocal samples were added to a couple of the songs), which would do honour to any Black metal band around! In fact, Freakangel's music is meant to sicken the listener's stomach, to rape and tear apart his ears (hey, I got that line from the short bio at the label's website, okay?). Personally, I feel that harshness to be quite okay and at acceptable levels (the guitars could've been more prominently built into the mix, for instance, or even be more present!), but I agree to the fullest with the label's assessing of the band as being one of the serious new contenders for the Dark Electro crown. At myspace.com/freakangelmusic, there's a threesome of songs for you to check out. Do so, and you'll most probably have to agree with the label's claim too! As per usual for Alfa Matrix, the album comes in different versions. For starters, the album is a collaboration release between the Belgian label and the Japanese Deathwatch Asia, and evidently the regular edition of the album has a couple of bonus tracks in Japan (4 remix tracks). The special edition of the album comes in the form of a bonus CD which, both in Japan (where it got the title the Deviations Of Divinity) and Belgium (where the bonus disc was dubbed Humanity By De-Fault), has a total of 13 remixes by other artists, including Preeemptive Strike 1.0, Shiv-R, Gothika, Acylum, Psy'Aviah, Ad Inferna, and many more (for the full lists, check out the band's page at the label's website). However, only 5 tracks seem to be overlapping and...now get this: Alfa Matrix has exchanged an limited amount of the Japanese versions with their own. Meaning if you hurry, maybe this 6-pannel digipak edition can still be available to the remix freaks among us! Hey, as for my personal appraisal, and in spite of my somewhat loathing comments on the lead vocals, I lóve this...hence the high notation (failed only jùst to make my year-lists, but then that might still change in the coming months, I sure you). 95/100 Tony. |