Album: The Divine Conspiracy
Released: September 7, 2007
Genre: Symphonic Metal
Track Listing:
- "Indigo ~ prologue" - 2:05
- "The Obsessive Devotion" - 7:13
- "Menace of Vanity" - 4:13
- "Chasing the Dragon" - 7:40
- "Never Enough" - 4:47
- "La‘petach Chatat Rovetz ~ the Final Embrace" - 1:46
- "Death of a Dream ~ the Embrace that Smothers part VII" - 6:03
- "Living a Lie ~ the Embrace that Smothers part VIII" - 4:56
- "Fools of Damnation ~ the Embrace that Smothers part IX" - 8:42
- "Beyond Belief" - 5:25
- "Safeguard to Paradise" - 3:46
- "Sancta Terra" - 4:57
- "The Divine Conspiracy" - 13:56
- "Higher High" (Bonus Track) - 5:27
- "Replica" (Fear Factory Cover) (Bonus Track) - 4:10
Grading: (Niche Weighted)
Listenability: A
Relistenability: A
Listening Experience: A
Variation: B+
Overall: A (HIGHLY Recommended*)
Let me start off by just saying, wow. Just wow. Epica is one of those bands that I don't stumble across very often, they're the type of band that just completely suck me in with each and every track they produce. Now, an important thing to note here, (hence the asterisk next to the Recommended above) the genre of symphonic metal is a little bit of a niche genre. Niche being that it may not reach every musical taste, but the level of development that Epica has within their tracks might just have the ability to bring people in.
I am seriously convinced that Simone Simons is one of the most incredible female vocalists, regardless of what genre you're looking at. Being symphonic metal she has the sort of operatic vocals with an incredible tone and timbre that can only be attained I think from years of vocal training (according to her Wikipedia entry she started doing classical vocal training at the age of 15 and she is now 23). What really separates Simone Simons vocals in my ears is the amount of pitch control that she has, also she doesn't go into the ear splitting glass shattering high end soprano notes which makes for an overall more pleaseant listening experience. What I mean by pitch control, is while she is singing you get the feeling that you could straighten picture frames with how completely center-line her pitch stays as she is singing any particular note (excluding vibrato of course).
One thing to note here is the vocals are not all done by Simone Simons on the track, along with sort of background vocal singers in certain places, there is the contrasting vocals of Mark Jansen who also provides some guitar work. A style thing associated with Epica is the fact that Mark Jansen's vocals consist of growled vocals, anyone who is familiar with the metal genre will probably know exactly what I mean by growled vocals. A defining style theme Epica has throughout their tracks is the contrasting vocals (which primarily consist of Simone Simons incredibly beautiful soprano vocals), but include portions of contrasting growl vocals from Mark Jansen which have a bit more of a rough and unrefined nature to them. I think this is one of the few points about Epica that may turn some people off since some people find growl/grunt/scream vocals very disagreeable with their personal music taste. However, I think the two styles clash nicely, and if you are one of those music listeners that feel like you will get turned off by the harsh grunt vocals I just want to point out that the majority of the vocal work is dominated by Simone Simons, and not by Mark Jansen. Most of the Mark Jansen vocals come in limited quanities and come in as at the more counterpoint vocal portions of the various songs.
The instrumentation arrangements of the tracks are also quite outstanding on this album (and in all of Epica's albums). Being "symphonic" metal there is of course the infusion of orchestral and band instruments, but there seems to have been a lot of attention paid to these tracks. I've heard a number of other "symphonic" metal bands that also had the infused orchestral/band instrumentation but they sometimes seemed lacking. Perhaps one thing that differs, is some bands opt more for computer generated instrumentation, but Epica at their formation also put together a choir (made up of two men and four women) and a string orchestra (three violins, two violas, two cellos and an upright bass). Not that I personally have a problem with computer generated instrumentation, but I think there's a certain quality that can't be generated by a computer, the human factor I think really makes a big difference.
As for tracks that really grabbed me on this particular album, The Obsessive Devotion, Chasing the Dragon, Never Enough, Death of a Dream ~ The Embrace That Smothers Part VII, Living a Lie ~ The Embrace That Smothers Part VIII, Beyond Belief, and The Divine Conspiracy all really jump out at me. This is DEFINITELY not to say that the other tracks aren't absolutely incredible as well, but these in particular really grab me (and yes I realize that's half of the tracks ;) ).
I should also point out that this is the fourth studio album released by Epica (first album being The Phantom Agony, second being Cosign to Oblivion, and third being The Score: An Epic Journey (which consists a fair amount of instrumental tracks)), and they have one of those discographies (for me) that I can seriously listen to EVERY single track and love every minute of it. I hate to hype it up so much, but Epica is seriously something substantial.
So although this happens to be a little bit of a niche genre, I think even somebody outside of the niche could still be drawn in by this band and this album. Another interesting thing to point out is I don't believe there are any foul lyrics within any of their albums (if that is of concern to you), I know when a lot of people see "metal" they immediately see that scary black sticker:
As far as I can tell (to be fair I haven't studied the precise lyrics of each and every song, but I can assure you the tracks are absent of any blatant obscenity) Epica has pretty clean lyrics.
So if you have the opportunity I definitely recommend picking up this album (or at least a few tracks off iTunes or whatever other fancy things you kids are using these days with your musics.
