CALIBAN
“GRAVITY”
Album Review By Vicky Milne
9/10
Over the years, Germany has presented some of the best metal bands the world knows, Rammstein, Kreator, Helloween, Grave Digger. The list goes on. In 1997, another band was formed named Never Again. Grafting for a year, this band released their first EP through Lifeforce Records, changed their name and toured all over Europe. Changing their name to Caliban and in 1999 released their first full length.
Now, when receiving this album to review, I mentioned the name to a few friends and had the response of ‘haven’t listened to them in years, they’re brilliant!!’. I can only say that listening to this album was a total pleasure.
Caliban have released ‘Gravity’, this is their 14th release since 1998, and their 10th full length, and boy oh boy is it a good one. Released through Century Media, It has a slightly different feel to their past, including this time, some clean vocals and a more anthemic approach.
Smashing into ‘Paralyzed’, the massive crunching riff just hits you. It’s a fine mix of melodic and aggressive metal as the chorus soars with melody and clean vocals, it flows into ‘Mein Schwartzez Herz’ (meaning My Black Heart), the track reserved for their native tongue. This is a heavy heavy track with scream all the way through, but again, a memorable chorus with clean backing vocals.
‘Who Am I’ is up next, which goes back to the soaring anthemic sound, this is one of the many tracks on the album that will do great with a live audience. The verses are super crunchy with riffs and hard drums, with the chorus loud and clean. The tempos constantly change throughout each track, which keeps it totally captivating and wondering what you’re going to get next. It suddenly speeds up with ‘Left Me For Dead’, a big big song, with a couple of epic and super heavy breakdowns, which is the same with the next track ‘Crystal Skies’, which also features a brief appearance from Jamie Graham (Heart of a Coward).
Speeding into ‘Walk Alone’ the opening verse is fast with a neck snapping riff and pummelling drums, however when the chorus kicks in, again with another memorable anthem, it loses momentum slightly but I feel doesn’t detract from the song in anyway as it quickly slams back into the verse, then another heavy breakdown. It’s finished off with the one of many guitar solos through the album. ‘The Oceans Heart’ is one of the best tracks on the album. It incorporates and melds all of the hardcore, metalcore and melodic elements perfectly with a tinge of death metal and wonderful backing vocals provided by Alissa White-Gluz (The Agonist, Arch Enemy) which really lifts this song.
‘BrOKen’ is a wonderful mix, it immediately starts with a memorable backing chorus, it’s slows down the album, almost like a little interlude halfway through. The lyrics stick in your mind, the guitars ease up and become the meolody that makes this track flow so effortlessly. ‘For We Are Forever’ and ‘Inferno’ are at opposite ends of the spectrum when it comes to the meaning of the songs, the first being very positive, the second being very dark but they are both great songs in themselves.
The penultimate track is ‘No Dream Without Sacrifice’ which definitely has rumblings of the band’s old sound, but, with quite a techy overtone, it’s fast, riff laiden and shouty and brings the album nicely to the final track, ‘Hurricane’, which has the best fist in the air chorus of them all. It’s pure cheese on toast, but it’s brilliant at the same time and completes this record brilliantly.
This album just oozes harcore and metalcore at it’s best, with a little sprinkle of djent for added flavour. It’s definitely a turn in direction for the band with trying to almost, modernise their metalcore/deathcore sound. But I personally think it’s worked very well on this album, having read some negative reviews. If this was meant as an experiment for a change in direction, then I think album 11 will be epic if they can mix both their old school sound with what this album contains.
LISTEN FOR: Mein Schwarzez Herz, brOKen, Hurricane
TRACKLIST:
Paralyzed
Mein Schwarzez Herz
Who I Am
Left For Dead
Crystal Skies
Walk Alone
The Ocean’s Heart
brOKen
For We Are Forever
Inferno
No Dream Without Sacrifice
Hurricane
CHECK THEM OUT:
http://www.calibanmetal.com/#page4
https://www.facebook.com/CalibanOfficial/timeline
LINEUP:
Scream & Clean Vocals: Andreas Dörner
Vocals & Guitar: Denis Schmidt
Bass: Marco Schaller
Guitar: Marc Görtz
Drums: Patrick Grün
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