Usually, I'm not at all into modern metal music and especially into metalcore and similar stuff and that's why this record from a rather unknown Chinese band that I discovered by pure coincidence hit me as hard as a howling train. Tarot Saint find exactly the right potion that mixes melodic and melancholic moments with harsher and agressive parts on this release and make bands such as Trivium look like silly mainstream plastic musicians for immature children.

Already the introduction blew me away. It has a very fond and relaxing atmosphere, some intriguing folk influences and beautiful acoustic guitars that gripped me right from the start. I thought that this was only a short opening sequence after all and thought that the upcoming songs would be less convincing. The following tracks are indeed different and more modern but they are nevertheless all of a very high quality. Only the song "悲怆之秋" also includes some minimal Chinese folk influences in the background and thanks to a very charismatic chorus, this track is maybe teh strongest one on here or it has at least the best commercial potential.

"绽放" starts with some melancholic guitar leads of a rather traditional heavy metal blend. This makes me think of the Gothenburg melodic death metal scene that is influenced by bands such as Iron Maiden concerning the melodic guitar work. These harmonies are now mixed with darker, harder and somewhat thrash metal orientated parts. One even finds three different kinds of vocal performances that create a lot of diversity in this song. First of all, there are smooth screams in the verses, than we have very melodic vocals with some slightly distorted effects over it giving the song a modern touch in the bridges and later even normal and quite catchy clean vocals. I've never heard such a high degree of diversity in a metalcore track before and I can tell you that this is just the beginning.

What follows is an excellent mixture of more direct and fast paced tracks and more laid back and emotionally longing songs. "拉尼娜" is a good example for the first category with really heavy and slow riffs somewhere between doom and thrash metal that create a desperate atmosphere and some very energizing vocals that make the whole thing sound very authentic in relation to the emotionally driven lyrics about the La Niña phenomenon. Concerning the second category, one can find songs such as "西楚霸王" that has an eerie and melancholic intro which reminds me of some old half ballads of Metallica before the track meanders in a very versatile way between dark verses featuring some sharp riffs and rather light choruses with addicting melodies. The whole concept is from time to time interrupted by short breaks that give you the time to calm down and focus on what comes next. That's why this song sounds a little bit more elaborated than most of the tracks on here. The best example for this progressive vein is though "混沌黎明" which happens to be the longest track on this debut record of the promising band from Beijing. The atmospheric breaks throughout the song make me think of bands such as Katatonia, Novembers Doom or even The Old Dead Tree. Once again, the mixture of heavier riffs and softer melodic parts represent a dominating factor that the band uses adequately.

Sadly, the record gets a little bit less spectacular towards the end. Especially the final two songs only focus on the agressive parts and forget about truly gripping hooks or atmospheric melodies. This being said, the rest of the record is musically diversified, highly emotionally driven and also very well produced and makes this surprising gem by far my favourite record of a genre that I really disliked before. If you feel the same, try this band out as their album as well as their first EP can be heard for free on their official side. Maybe these guys will change your mind about metalcore as it was the case for me.

It's not as if "Shadows Of War" was a bad Loudness album but it clearly falls off in comparison to the groundbreaking previous releases "Disillusion" and "Thunder In The East". This record delivers nothing more and nothing less than solid Heavy Metal music inhabited by a typical spirit of the eighties. The songs on here are catchy but this time the band didn't go a step further by adding anything new to the usual formula. Many songs sound quite similar in between themselves and also in comparison to the band's previous efforts. It lacks of original ideas and truly gripping and unique songs. One can hear that this album is even more mainstream orientated than the ones the band released before and is adapted to the North American market rather than to the generally more open minded market in Japan. It's a perfect record for any fan of traditional Heavy Metal music, a simple feel good soundtrack to hit the open road, nine tracks for nostalgic moments that didn't really pass the test of time.

Among the more outstanding songs figures "Complication" which is a song that kicks off rather fast but quickly takes a turn towards a more progressive vein. Especially the pumping bass guitar can convince in this song when it takes the lead in a break towards the middle of the track. On the other hand, the more commercial "Dark Desire" convinces with a different sort of breaks that are rather calm and introspective but that also turn out to work quite well. My favourite song on here is probably "Face To Face" which is one of the fastest track on the album. The guitar solos are pitiless but always remain melodic, the bass guitar is more vivid than usual and the drum play is also quite vital on this album highlight. The mixture of an unchained instrumental section and a catchy sing along chorus works very well in this track. The album would have needed more songs of this quality to become more than just a good average release.

In the end, this album is a good choice for traditional metal heads that like nostalgic music of the eighties with catchy choruses to bang, dance and sing along. From that point of view, I would recommand "Let It Go" because it is defintely the catchiest song on here and has a huge hit single potential for its time. Most of the tracks are hold in a mid tempo pace featuring melodic guitar solos and numerous commercially flavoured hooks. The few tracks that stand out happen to be the most interesting ones but they are too few to prevent this record from being a little bit too closed minded and even slightly boring from time to time. From the band's first releases, this album is clearly the weakest one but it's still everything but a failure. It's more one of your usual Heavy Metal records that is nice to give it a spin from time to time but definitely not a release that will leave a deep impression.

Welcome again on my blog,

I didn't only celebrate my real life birthday last week but I can also celebrate another kind of special day today because I've decided to bring my first and only personal blog to life exactly one year ago.

Several reasons led me to this choice as I'm normally rather sceptical towards modern technologies and I still don't have any cell phone, game console or television at home, nor a FaceBook, Google Plus, Myspace, Twitter or Skype account. I'm recognizing the potential of social medias but I still prefer to meet new people, go out and travel in my real life. I prefer to move on while I simply see too many people wasting their precious time on the internet and get stuck in their boring routine.

At a certain point, I though wanted to archive my different works that I had done over many years and give people some references about me. In fact, everything essential I have done during the last decade is now on this site. I also decided to create this site to get some constructive feedback in order to always develop further as I am a perfectionist who's always open for new horizons. This blog is also there to help or inform people about different things. This whole thing is not only a personal archive or a nostalgic look back but my blog has been created to move on, inspire people and get inspired by them in a beautiful and large exchange. That's why I'm practicing and writing in English, French and German on this site and there are even some bits in Mandarin or Russian you can find.

That's why I still hope that the internet community will react more and more to my different projects and spread the name of my works. Since the last year, I have put a lot of stuff on this site: book, film and music reviews, interviews, newspaper articles, novels, poems, tourist guides, universitarian works and so much more. As of today, exactly 5182 visitors have taken a look on my blog and I even got contacted by friends but also by journalists or teachers I didn't know from time to time and who were reacting to a special article on this page which is a great feedback.

I would also like to mention that I had created a YouTube account a little bit more than one year ago which has exactly 11,101 views as of today which is a quite beautiful and also elevated number.

I hope you keep on supporting my projects and maybe you can help to spread the word about this blog. I'm also always open for any constructive comment. Feel free to interact with me or even other visitors or maybe possible users in the future and make this place more dynamical and interactive.

While I hope to get some comments from all of you people around the world, I also wish to eventually really meet certain persons that are now reading these lines and that are close to my universitarian community and me - if you think I'm talking about you, don't hesitate to leave a message!

Thanks again for your faithful attention over the past 365 days!

Sebastian