Customer Reviews

Black Waltz

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is Kalmah's fourth album, entitled The Black Waltz. The album cover is positively ugly! Despite the terrible artwork, the album is very good. Perhaps the most notable change of the music is the vocals. Instead of the usual higher pitched screams (used in Black Metal), we have much lower death growls. I actually like these vocals more, although they are rather incoherent at times. The album is Melodic Death metal, with Thrash parts thrown in. The keyboards provide a grandiose Symphonic sound. The song lengths range from 4 minutes to 5 and a half minutes. (With the exception of Svieri Doroga, which is a minute long). Comparisons to Children Of Bodom are ridiculous, because Bodom is more power/melodic death, whereas this is much heavier (less `cheesy') Melodic Death. The keyboard act as more of an instrument, and accompanies the guitar with the solos. As per usual, the twin Gothenburg guitars are present: one doing lead/solos and the other as the rhythm guitar.

Defeat is a strong opener with eerie Symphonic parts mixed with bombtastic double bass drumming and a guitar-keyboard solo. (A good band comparison would be Wintersun (minus the clean vocals), as Wintersun mixes a load of genres together, with a lot of keyboard work.) Black Metallic Side sounds a little bit like Bodom, but it is heavier. Time Takes Us All begins with powerful drumming, orchestral keyboard work and catchy guitar riffs. To The Gallows mixes minor/diminished chords in the verse with major/minor chords to powerful bass work. The keyboards are not featured as much, leaving a more raw sound.

Svieri Doroga is an acoustic/drum interlude. The Black Waltz is a slower song (well slow compared to the first four pounding tracks), with long drawn out death growls. Around the 2.50 mark a slow string/drum part is played, followed by a beautiful solo. With Terminal Intensity is very reminiscent to a Dark Tranquillity song, vocals and all. There is a barrage of drumming to the keyboards. It also has quite a cool Thrash-like solo. Man Of The King is a fast frenzy of instruments. I love the chorus in this song. The keyboards play a rather horror-like melody, empowering the chorus. At the 2.08 mark the drums pound out an intense rhythm and all the instruments come together for the highlight of the song.

Groan of Wind is a little slower, with a delightful almost folk-like tune played with the guitars. It's an epic, highly melodic song. Mindrust is a heavier song, with the best solo in the album. From 2.51 there is a rather distorted, heavy section. One From The Stands has a catchy bass-drum introduction followed by the twin guitars. Although it's the last song, it's my favourite. This song is also quite Dark Tranquillity like.

I'd give this 4.5 because some of the songs sound too similar. Nevertheless the musicianship is excellent and the guitar work on is top form. I recommend this to Melodic Death metal fans, or to anyone who likes Metal and doesn't mind death vocals.

I really like all of Kalmahs previous releases, but they seemed to be lacking in some way; like they were on the cusp of something great but just couldnt push it over the edge. Well now they have. This is the best Melodic Death CD I have ever heard! They simply took the best elements out of every band out there and forged them into something amazing. The synth are a not so in your face version of Children of Bodom, The lead guitar harmonies are a beautiful mixture of Dark Tranquilites fast stacato riffing mixed with the violence and melody of old in Flames. The softer parts alude to my personal favorite 'Insomnium'. This has been the only cd i have been listening to for several weeks now just because there is no reason to listen to anything else. Kalman has perfected the genre! All hail.

I loved this band the moment i got a song from swamplord. Their CD's all have a unique sound compared to each other, and this CD had massive changes in it, most good, and only one thing bad that i can think of.

The good is that the vocals uses deep growling in this cd, and it sounds absolute amazing with the deeper sound of the music as a whole. The deeper sound of the music was completely awesome too. The recording sound of this CD is fracking rich in how it portrays all the technical sounds of the guitar and the insane pounding of the drums. "Time takes us all" is my favorite song because of the sound. I don't know if it is because the band created this sound or if it is because the recordings are clearer and just plain more awesome, but whatever happened was incredible. This CD has amazing rifts that are unbelievably catchy and, heck, i'll say awe-inspiring. That is the hole reason why i love all the bands CD's as i have found all the sounds they have created to be awe-inspiring. But that leads to a point of negativity in the new sound of kalmah. I loved their old CD's because the guitarists created a sound that i would associate with fantasy movies/books. I don't know if i could ever describe it to you other than it sounds like fantasy music. It was unbelievably cool :) But they pretty much completely lost that sound, except for a little in "Groan of Wind" and "Defeat".

The best part of the CD though that i have yet to mention is the drumming, which sounds absolutely awesome. It is so deep is sounds like a machine gun cannon. Not that the double-bassmanship is insanely fast like Amon Amarth, but it comes pretty close and fits with this new deep sound perfectly.

This is a masterpiece in my opinion. The deepness of the vocals and drums makes the the band better. And the rifts in this CD by the guitars and keyboards and what make this their best cd so far in my opinion.

Of all Kalmah's albums, the vocals on Black Waltz are the most commanding, and the production value is at its peak. The songs are all complex and layered, and have well crafted transitions throughout. The album positively 'works' together as a whole, with every song contributing its weight, and is easily played straight through. I was a fan of Kalmah from Swamplord and Swampsong, so I pre-ordered Black Waltz off Amazon a few years back. This album was a contender for best metal album of 2006, and is still on my listening rotation; it desreves your attention.

I Purchased this album at the same time as 12 gauge. In my opinion this album is far better that 12 gauge, although 12 gauge was good as well. This friggin album kills it! Incredibly threatening and unique. There are a lot more deep vocals than usual, but it still sounds awesome! Definately get this. One of all times most under-rated bands ever.

Kalmah and Norther are two examples of the best melodic death metal has to offer. On this album Kalmah explores with more melodies, and not in your face keyboarding, with perfect harmonies and excellent musicianship. If you like real melodic death metal like Dark Tranquility, this is for you. Also, strong recommended Norther.

If you're a fan of Kalmah or melodic death metal, buy this cd!!
It is a must for any fan of that genre.

By far the best record ever from Kalmah with 11 tracks of non-stop heavy songs and great mix of symphonic sounds and electric guitar.

Kalmah is my favorite melodic death metal band ever so this review may not be very helpful to people who are trying to hear the pro's and con's of the band but i'll do my best. Unlike most of their albums this is the first one in which Pekka kokko focuses mainly on deep vocals rather than high pitch and he does a fantastic job. He has the best sounding deep growl i've ever heard and it matches beautifully with the music. As always this album is better than their last and im sure it will continue that way. Kalmah will always be a band that you say their last album is their best. They have beautiful guitar and keyboard melodies and also heavy guitar and drums and the vocals are the icing on the cake. If you love melodic death metal YOU MUST HAVE THIS ALBUM! especially with how cheap its gotten being an imported cd since their from finland. When it first came out on amazon it was over $40 and I just bought one new and including shipping it was only $19.96. My favorite song on the album is To the Gallows.

Well, from the first dark, crunchy guitar riff, it's obvious that that this isn't a typical Kalmah album. One of the most standout (and very probably the most controversial) changes lies in the vocal style, which have changed from phlegm-drenched black metal shrieks to low-register "cookie monster" death growls. I'm not a fan of the new vocals (take the terribly under-melodic vocal intro to "Time Takes Us All", for example), but I wasn't a huge fan of the old ones either, so this isn't a breaking issue for me. Eventually I got used to the old ones, but they were very grating for quite a while. The quality and creativity haven't really changed; they've simply switched ends of the spectrum, so this issue really comes down to personal preference. However, a lot more than the vocals changed here.

Kalmah dropped most (all?) of their power metal influences in this album, and adapted to more firmly melo-death territory. The tempos have slowed a bit, and the guitar work has (for the most part; some of their old guitar style remains) converted to a heavier, more riff-based format. One plus is that the bass is given much more room to shine (and a much more audible mix). This, along with vastly improved drumming, which incorporates much more rhythmic variety (especially breaks), give the band a much deeper, darker, more developed sound than that of previous recordings, and the production has vastly improved to boot.

The guitar technicality seems to me to be at a similar level to old Kalmah during the meat of the songs, though the slower tempos and focus on melody may subtract a bit. The rhythm guitar seems to have improved significantly and is much more prominent here, though the lead guitar is a bit less frequently present than old Kalmah. Fortunately the soloing is at least on par with their previous work with regards to both keys and guitar IMO. Unfortunately, the keys sometimes step back a bit in comparison to before (even in mix volume), providing atmosphere and accents more often than the blistering polymelodic work so prevalent before. This is very much a guitar-driven and guitar-focused album. The melodies on this album are excellent and far more appreciable than before, though (to my personal disappointment) most neoclassical elements have been dropped in favor of greater focus on Kalmah's vaguely folkish "swamp" feel/theme.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------<-8.5/10->-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

In short, Kalmah died and was reborn with this disk; they're still distinctly Kalmah, but their focus, sound, strengths, and perhaps even sub-genre have shifted. Both more melodic and more rhythmically interesting, yet less keyboard-centric and a bit slower, they became a much deeper, darker, and more unified band in my opinion equally good while vastly different.

Kalmah is proving to be like a fine wine or beer, improving in depth, complexity, and taste with age. Their tuning is down for a deeper, more tectonic effect, and the richness of their instrumentation and melodies are waaay up. Anyone with the slightest sympathy for melodic death metal owes it to themselves to check out this unique, energizing band.