Customer Reviews

Soulburner

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This CD is one of the best European releases in the Death Metal Genre. The guitars and vocals mix very well and I find myself rockin out every time I listen to this CD. If you like In Flames, Therion, or Six Feet Under, you must check this CD out.

This is the first record I've purchased from Gardenian and I actually got it for free during a free CD givaway from a local radio station. All the CD's they had there were pretty much low budget trash so I figured this wouldn't be any different. Needless to say I was wrong. This would best be put under the catagory of Melodic Death Metal, although it isn't as hard hitting as usual Cannibal Corpse/early Fear Factory Death metal, but still pretty hard on some songs. Sweden seems to just spit out great metal bands such as this one, Opeth and In Flames.
The record opens great with "As a True King," a fast,hard hitting song with a great chorus. It continues this with track 2 and 3. At track 4 "Soulburner" is where the disk starts to not be as good, it just tends to slow down its fast pace. That and track 5 are OK, but I would just end up hitting the skip button. Then comes track 6 "Small Electric Space" which I can't stand hearing. It picks itself back up with the hard hitting track 7 "Chaos", 8-"Ecstacy of life", 9-"Tell the World I'm sorry", and 11-"Black Days" (A great song, probably the best on the album). All track 7,8,9, and 11 are great fast paced, hard songs with great growling vocals mixed with melodic ones too.
My main gripe with this album is mostly with the lead singers voice. Given he's got an amazing growl voice, I can't stand to hear his melodic voice more then a few seconds. During certain chorus's like that of Track 3 are good, but the reason I couldn't stand 6-"small electric space" is because he sings melodically during the whole song. He does have a good voice in general, but he sounds like an actor that just came off a New York Broadway musical. The voice is just, well, fruity to really grab my attention without making me want to hit the skip button. It's not a strong melodic voice; it's good but still weak.
Besides these few songs I didn't care for on this record I was very surprised it was this good. Sure, it isn't a classic by any means but it's definitly a lot of fun to pop in the CD player and listen to, I would definitely recommend this album to any fan of melodic or swedish death metal.

At a first glance it would be easy to lump Gardenian with At The Gates, Soilwork, The Haunted or any other melodic death metal band from Gothenburg. The typical sound, the typical melodies, the typical vocals. But take a deeper listen and they are actually putting out material with more variety and innovation. OK, so they're nowhere near Opeth, Amorphis, In Flames or to a lesser extent Children Of Bodom in terms of originality, but they incorporate lots of clean (and female) vocals, a variety of tempos and heaviness, quiet moments and a degree of subtlety. Take Small Electric Space for example. This song has no death metal vocals at all, and is a brilliant song with great melodies but also a dose of aggression. Not that Gardenian can't rock when they want to. One listen to the blistering opener As A True King can confirm that.

Although it is fair to say that in the general running of the Swedish melodic death metal scene Gardenian are yet to find their own sound, what they do with that sound is considerably more varied and innovative than most other Gothenburg style metal bands that I've heard. If you want something innovative then I recommend Follow The Reaper by Children Of Bodom or Orchid by Opeth. If you want something very heavy all the way through then check out Whisper Supremacy by Cryptopsy or Close To A World Below by Immolation. It is certainly fair to say that if you've heard it all before then you could give it a miss, but if you are put off by incredibly heavy music or feel that you do not have much patience and you prefer just to get to the meat of the sandwich (in a musical sense of course!), then Soulburner is a worthy enough addition to your collection.

Those familiar with the so-called "Gothenburg Sound" will know what to expect here. The music is crushingly heavy but with melody laden thoughout. Catchy tunes. The vocals are predominantly death to death-black growls. A second session vocalist provides some Bruce Dickinson-esque moments as well. Surprisingly, for an album that frequently includes clean vocals, the album is mostly straight-ahead melodic death and is less accessible than, say, In Flames' or Dark Tranquillity's latest releases.

Not the most original material in the world, but if you, like myself, can't get enough metal (particularly of the heavy-yet-melodic variety), this is for you.

This was the first album I bought this year, and boy its a good one. The style is similar to that of In Flames, yet it combines elements such as clean vocals, occasional female vocals, and some keyboards to make an outstanding album. This is probably what Dark Tranquillity was trying to create with Projector, except on Soulburner everything works.

This is a great buy at any price. It's just plain great. It's probably one of the best melodic death metal CD I've ever had the pleasure to listen to.
The songs are quite great, heavy, melodic, and varied.
The main vocalist-Jim Kjell-usually has a deep growl/yell. But, there is another vocalist-Eric Hawk-whom provides some very melodic and great, if just a bit on the fruity side, vocals. On many of the songs the songs Jim and the guy who sounds like he just came from broadway-Eric-sort of have a battle of the vocals, which is pretty great. Also on the second song there are some beautiful female vocals-Sabrina Khilstrand-which gives a great eerie feel to the song.
All in all if you like your death metal with a side of melody, get this. I'm sure you'll like it. Also check out their other CD Sindustries, it's different but still good.

Released in 1999, Soulburner was the second album from Swedish melodic death metal band Gardenian, one of the "second tier" bands from the Gothenburg scene that followed in the footsteps of In Flames, Soilwork, and Dark Tranquillity.

While still in large part a melodic death metal album, Gardenian pushed the envelope with Soulburner. The album featured more keyboards, the occasional female vocal part, and a major clean vocal presence (courtesy of Artch frontman Erik Hawk). This new direction alienated a fair amount of the band's fanbase, but I thought it made for a much more interesting overall album. The combination of death metal and Iron Maiden style power metal elements worked pretty well, and was a precursor to the sound bands like Mercenary, Into Eternity and Raintime would later adopt.

Ultimately the new direction was scrapped in favor of a return to a more straightforward melodic death metal sound with 2000's Sindustries. Fans of Gardenian's early work will no doubt prefer Sindustries, but anyone into the more adventurous extreme metal bands like Dark Tranquillity, Mercenary and Children of Bodom should find a lot to like in Soulburner.

NOTE: Soulburner and Sindustries were recently remastered and reissued as a 2-disc set. Given how readily available both albums are, I really don't see the logic in reissuing them. I'd much rather see a reissue of the hard to find debut album Two Feet Stand, which is (at present) only available as a pricey Japanese import.

This is just a great album. A session vocallist was taken in to do the clean vocals which sound very power metallish although a little less silly. Overall this is definitely one of the best releases to pick up if you're into Melodic Death Metal... lately there's been a lot of bands joining the trend of adding harmonized clean vocals to their albums and virtually every time the band sounds better than it did before... we saw this with Soilwork's A Predator's Portrait (their best) The Haunted's The Haunted Made Me Do It, and In Flames as well... forget if it was Colony or Clayman that they started doing it. But anyway The guitar sound on this is about the best i've heard... very crunchy, hard to compare it to anything because to my ears it sounds better than even the mighty In Flames crunch! Also this has some super catchy melodic hooks that don't sound like a copy of another band, quite original. The formula is the same but to my ears doesn't sound like i've heard it before. I didn't go through the album saying "hmm... i've heard this before". Anyway, a great album by a great (and underrated) band. Their next one Sindustries is even better! their growly vocalist took on the duties of clean vocals and his vocals DON'T sound like power metal, they sound better! I think any fan of Melodic Death needs to own these two Gardenian albums... i am seriously suprised that there's only 8 reviews of this at the time i write this! it's not exactly new... was released in 99 i think or something!

GARDENIAN are yet another Swedish product cranking out the DARK TRANQUILLITY meets IN FLAMES "happy" Death Metal party tunes. Well, that is a bit of an overstatement since I can hardly call this album happy but I do confess I enjoy cracking open a few beers when I listen to this album and that means I've been drunk as of late because this album rarely leaves my cd player! Its been an outrageous month of purchases for me and Soulburner is among the top three I've made in a long while. Diversity seems to be the approach here and GARDENIAN certainly excel at stirring the melting pot because listening to this album had my mind cycling through the genres. The album begins in the typical Swedish melodic fashion, with heaviness being a key trait. I was immdiately struck by the DARK TRANQUILLITY meets ARCH ENEMY feel and was attuned my senses for that type of journey for the duration. However, it isn't long before the female vocals kick in and then the standard Heavy Metal vocals which, incidentally, are absolutely terrific. Vocalist Jim Kjell's range and power are more than enough to give Bruce Dickenson a run for his money. I was astounded to hear that type of power and skill come out of throat of a guy who also growls like a beast most of the way through the album! Its this blinding contrast however, that makes Soulburner such an awesome listen. GARDENIAN have taken Sweden's current trend of melodic Death Metal one step further by injecting a massive embolism of Power/Heavy Metal into the mix with resuls that are patently solid. Soulburner is amazing at times and so much so that I think this is the type of album that can serve to bridge the gap between traditional Heavy Metal circles and the underground. Now some of you may frown upon that end but GARDENIAN are the type of band that serve as ambassadors to the Metal community, demonstrating the forgotten link between standard Metal and the darker side of the scene. GARDENIAN are also far enough removed from other Swedish acts to make them an original entity and one that ought to be recognized upon first listen. Get this and grab yourself a six pack on the way back, you'll need it!

This is their debut album..Gardenian has 3 vocalists which blends nicely with the catchy/melodic riffs. The lyrics are not typical death metal ones there is actually an implicit meaning to them. Tell the world I'm sorry is my fav track. Great album to pick up if you're into the swedish melodicism.