I should admit I'm not a music critic, nor do I have a background in playing any sort of musical instrument.
I do, however, have a background in writing. And I've been listening to hard rock music for a long time.
Every now and then, I'm going to make an effort to make music a part of this blog. A few months ago, I shared my thoughts about attending a live HIM concert. Today, I wanted to analyze a new album from one of my favorite bands of all-time — Avenged Sevenfold.
Last Tuesday, on July 27, Sevenfold released their fifth full-length album entitled 'Nightmare.' Eager to pick up my copy, I went to Best Buy and made the purchase for $9.99.
I'm quickly realizing that was 10 of the best dollars I've ever spent.
Admittedly, I didn't immediately connect with the album. I wasn't quite sure what I was about to hear. Before purchasing the CD, I had heard three tracks, and they all sounded relatively different. What would the rest of the CD entail?
I think I have a good idea of the answer now. Lead singer M. Shadows, who writes most of the songs, gives us a personal account of how deeply the band was affected by the passing of drummer Jimmy 'The Rev' Sullivan. The emotion expressed in this album far exceeds any of Sevenfold's previous work.
Over the years, the band has done a great job of sticking to their image. The death bat. Nighttime rock. Halloween. Occasional light, represented by dueling guitars, cast over mostly dark images. I recently saw Sevenfold described as Tim Burton-rock, a reference to the Batman film director. How perfect is that?
The band has changed its sound, but the guys have kept the image impressively intact. Sevenfold often sprinkles their albums with biblical verses, deep suffering/loss, and emotional stress, but it was almost as if they presented it on a fictional platform. I always thought of a video game, for some reason, when I listened to 'City of Evil.' Remember that Sonic the Hedgehog dark level with the beams of light? That's Sevenfold. And it was awesome. Still is.
Where am I going with this? Put more simply, 'Nightmare' is their most realistic, emotionally-driven album to date. Why conjure up biblical images when the guys have a first-hand account of deep suffering? That's what you get with 'Nightmare.' It's as real as the band has ever been.
That said, they stick to their guns. There's still dueling guitars, face-melting solos and pedal-pumping drum beats. Dream Theater drummer Mike Portnoy does a fantastic job of filling in for Rev on the recording.
One thing I love about Sevenfold? Their songs are more than 3-4 minutes in length. It may not get as much radio time, but that's probably a good thing. I like the band's popularity where it is now. Mainstream, in a sense, but not as mainstream as a band like Godsmack or Disturbed, for instance.
Sure enough, 'Nightmare' has four songs that are more than six minutes long. The last song, 'Save Me,' checks in at right under 11 minutes.
The songs are brilliantly done. My favorite on the album has to be 'Buried Alive,' which is something I'd be more likely to hear on Metallica's '...And Justice for All' album than anything else. The intro features a melodic rhythm guitar, before progressing to the first verse. The advancement to the chorus is almost akin to Metallica's 'One.' It's like two separate songs in the same production. It's amazing how they pull it off. Gates' guitar solo is incredible. I'd rate this song in the top five of anything they've done.
I noticed a few other influences on the album as well. In 'Victim,' for instance, the intro and outro feature a female voice singing at harmonizing levels. I couldn't help but think of Pink Floyd's 'Dark Side of the Moon' when hearing it.
'God Hates Us' is the closest the band has come to recreating a song off 'Waking the Fallen,' the epic 2003 album known as their heaviest ever. Shadows does an amazing job of keeping the wild song controlled, if that makes any sense. It's actually a very controlled, crisp song. It took me three listens to come to that realization.
There are ballads, too, like 'So Far Away,' a song written by Gates, fully dedicated to the Rev.
There's a mix between heavy and ballad in 'Danger Line,' a song that starts hard, only to slow down to a brilliant breakdown at the conclusion. When Shadows utters the words "I'm free," Gates breaks into a solo, which might be my favorite part of the entire CD.
I'm still less than a week into listening to the new CD, so it's tough for me to rank it with their other albums. If I had to guess, I'd say my order will eventually look like this:
• Waking the Fallen
• Nightmare
• City of Evil
• Avenged Sevenfold (self-titled)
That's high praise from me, considering I thought 'City of Evil' was one of the best albums of the new decade.
'Nightmare' takes the listener to a place that we've never been before with Avenged Sevenfold. You can sense what they're going through. And as wrong as it seems to say — RIP, Rev — the result is sheer brilliance.
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