Years in the Darkness

Arkaea | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (July 14, 2009)
• Original Release Date: 2009
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Koch Records
• ASIN: B002BVYBGA
• In-Print Editions: Audio CD  |  Vinyl  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #84,891 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Editorial Reviews

2009 debut release from this band featuring Fear Factory members Raymond Herrera and Christian Olde Wolbers and Threat Signal members Jon Howard and Pat Kavanagh. Arkaea is the next step in the Fear Factory legacy. Featuring material that was originally intended for the next Fear Factory record, Years In The Darkness, takes the band's pioneering cyber Metal sound in an even heavier direction while still preserving the melody and shear power the band are famous for. With all members now fully committed to Arkaea, the band is poised to pick up where Fear Factory left off.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars I really wanted to like this....., July 19, 2009

By 

Bradley S. Smith - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Years In The Darkness [Explicit] (MP3 Download)

From the first listen of the first song off this album, Locust, I thought this band could be pretty awesome. I am a longtime Fear Factory fan and I thought Threat Signal's debut album was good. Mix the two bands up and you should have a great new band, right? Not quite. First off, every song on the album follows the exact same formula, making each song sound remarkably like the one before it. Second, the clean singing vocals on this sound like it came off of a Linkin Park album. The verdict: This is an ok album, but it won't be on heavy rotation on my iPod. I hope Raymond and Christian make their way back into Fear Factory ASAP before Arkaea go back into the studio and write 12 more variations of the same song.

5 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Oh how the mighty have fallen., July 19, 2009

By 

Jason Young - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Years in the Darkness (Audio CD)

I hardly ever write reviews but atm this album has a 4.5 star average and that's just misleading.
Now I wasn't expecting much but I was still let down. The majority of the tracks sound devoid of creativity and frighteningly similar to many woefully bad nu-metal bands.
I found some solace in certain sections where Ray showed he still retains some drumming prowess but it seems pretty clear by now that Christian is incapable of writing interesting riffs. I've heard worse singers but Howard certainly didn't help improve the sub-par songwriting. The bass was ok.
I really wanted to like this cd but in a way I'm glad these would-be fear factory tracks came out under a different name since after Transgression this would have been at least as much a final nail in the coffin as the botched "reorganization" perhaps is.

6 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars I thought Nu metal was dead, no?, August 2, 2009

By 

happy_to_be_here (ATL) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Years in the Darkness (Audio CD)

I would describe this as FF meets Linkin Park. Why? As a previous reviewer states all the clean vocals sound like that dude from LP and every chorus sounds like it belongs on an LP album. BTW, I hate LP so this is not something that I enjoy.

I read somewhere that half the music for this was supposed to be the next FF album - so right there this makes Arkaea a FF clone only with a bad singer. The other half of the music doesn't sound that much different. If this had been recorded as Fear Factory with Burton performing the vocals I'd probably rate this as a 3.5 as it really wouldn't expand the FF sound, but at least I wouldn't cringe during the vocals.

Bottom line - if you ever wondered what a project combining FF and LP would sound like, your wish came true.