OMNIO

An amazing album... very emotional piece of work from a so called "black metal" band. In fact, it sounds more like a mix of atmospheric metal, doom metal and dark rock with an operatic feeling... nothing black metal at all. It has the emotion of Anathema, the darkness and sadness of Katatonia and the epicness of Opeth.

"299 796 km/s" opens the album with a great epic which perfectly summarizes everything that can be found on the album - operatic male and female vocals, great guitar lines enhanced by classical instruments (violin, viola, cello), metallic moments blending with more mellow passages but always in an emotional way. "I Am Your Flesh" starts more aggressively with heavy guitars and even a few angry grunts, but very quickly it turns into a sorrowful piece of dark metal, with vocal emotions ranging from anger to despair. "Kairos!" is the only short track on the album, and it's totally different from the rest of the songs here - it's a ballad that starts with acoustic guitar solo and only female vocals can be heard (the last half of the song really sounds like a Tristania ballad... the female vocalist really has a wonderful voice). "Weeping Willow" is my least favorite track on the album - this second epic has a quite long and boring intro, but things start to get better after 3 minutes when the heavier guitars take the lead. "Omnio?" ends the album like it began, with an awesome epic, a 25 minutes long song divided in three parts. "Pre" starts with the "Paradise Lost" sounding guitar (like on the first song) and again a mix of male and female operatic vocals (the female sings both in english and french on this song). The last guitar line fades out and "bardo" starts like a keyboard interlude before acoustic then electric guitars join for the eeriest moment on the album, ending on an angry scream. "Post" starts with a piano intro and female vocals - another beautiful moment - before growing again with guitars, strings and male vocals like on the first part of the song.

Rating: 97/100 (5 stars - highly recommended)