1. "Lightning & Snow". Starts pleasant enough. Melodic guitars. "There was a flash of lightning, followed by snow". Damn lightning snows. There is a weird chorus part that sounds like it's sung by the singer of the Crash Test Dummies. That sounds pretty awkward. Not a fan of this first track.
2. "Death Is Not An Exit". More Crash Test Dummies vocals. I'm nervous now about this choice for the album of the day. I think this song is about how humanity was nothing 4000 years ago and how we'll be nothing again in the future. Nope, not feeling this at all. "Wooooo-oh-ohhhhhh, death isssssss not an exxxit".
3. "Keeper Of The Ledger". Better vocals open this track. More of a growl. I think one of the lyrics in this was "Nature is the business after all". Keep the Crash Test Dummies guy on the sideline for this one please. I wonder if it's actually the same guy. A quick Wikipedia search shows that the only similarity, besides the sound of some of the vocals, is that both bands are from Canada. Wikipedia also shows that the singer of Woods of Ypres died in a car accident in 2011. I'll stop the CTD comparison at this point, because this revelation actually kind of bums me out. RIP David Gold. I'm not a huge fan of your band, but it's still pretty cool all the time you put into it.
4. "Traveling Alone". Wikipedia calls Woods of Ypres a "blackened doom metal band". I'm not hearing it. It's pretty straight forward corny rock, with tinges of metal. It's not good at all. I think the song is about how there is no god.
5. "Adora Vivos". Guitars start off pretty messy. Lyrics kick in: "A moment of silence/But not one moment more/The dead are to be forgotten/We are here to be...ADORED". I have no idea what's going on in these Woods of Ypres. I think this is knocking sermons, which I'm ok with, but the execution is just so bad. The metal vocals kick in halfway through the song to save it. If they stick to the growl, I think they would have been a lot better to listen to. "We shouldn't worship the dead".
6. "Silver". Balladish*. Not good. "When you're silver, you never combust/When you're silver, the truth always hurts".
*After skimming for my review before posting, I have no idea what I meant to type here. "Balladish"? Not sure, but it's staying.
7. "Career Suicide (Is Not Real Suicide)". True.
8. "Modern Life Architecture". So bland I'm sure. At 7 minutes 22 seconds, I guess Woods of Ypres have a lot of thoughts on the subject. I have no interest in paying attention to this song, but it turns out the history of Ypres is pretty significant. Pretty big World War I battle site. Here are the ruins of Ypres from 1919, which suggest a need for modern life architecture:
9. "Kiss My Ashes (Goodbye)". Ugh. The song is somehow worse than the title of the track.
10. "Finality". I'm lost.
11. "Alternate Ending". This could have ended like 10 songs ago. The alternate is an alternate for a reason.
This was bad.
Grade: 1 out of 5 decapitated goats.
Top Tracks:
1. Keeper of the Ledger
2. Adora Vivos
3.
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