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SILENT SCYTHE 'Suffer In Silence' New Aeon Media (2004)
I really have to hand it to both Karmageddon Media and New Aeon Media. When most of the well-known record labels decide to "play it safe" by signing already established Metal bands, those two Dutch labels dedicate themselves to bringing new and promising bands to the surface.
In the most recent pile of CDs that I received from The Netherlands was the promo of another new band called Silent Scythe. Most of the times, I can understand just by looking at the album cover what kind of band I am dealing with, but this practice didn’t seem to be that effective with the album cover of "Suffer in Silence" (I guess that there is always an exception that proves the rule).
A quick look at New Aeon Media’s press release informed me that the band comes from Sweden and that their style is a deadly mix of Swedish Death/Thrash, and European Power Metal music.
All that sounds very good, but I prefer to hold a small basket when I’m told that there are plenty of apples around (old Greek saying). I realised that trying to collect information for the band through any other source was pointless, so I decided to go for the only other available option - listen to the album and judge for myself.
Well, the one and a half minute intro that opens for the album was not that helpful either, and when the first guitar riff of "Longing for Sorrow" appeared, I was frightened that Silent Scythe would be just another The Haunted clone. It was then that the Halfordesque voice of Fredrik Eriksson came to ease my worries. Yes, now I knew that I had something good to look forward to. Both vocals and guitars of "Old World Disorder" are reminiscent of Iced Earth.
The influence of the American Power Metal scene is more obvious in "My Own Family" and the key word here is Nevermore, both in terms of technical abilities and song presentation. "Backstabber" is a straight forward fast Heavy Metal composition that paves the way for the same titled composition "Suffer in Silence" which continues in the same manner (I am still trying to figure out if Warrel Dane has participated in this project or not).
For the end, Silent Scythe have left two of their longest compositions - "To Each His Own" and "Feather", with the first being another tribute song to Iced Earth and the latter a pointless composition that a) doesn’t mix with the rest of the songs and b) if avoided, it would have helped more in the final evaluation of the album.
Don’t buy this album if you expect to listen to another band that follows in the footsteps of The Haunted. There is something really good that’s been going on here, but it will take a little more time for this band to realise their potential and come up with a more self-aware effort.
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Review by John Stefanis
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