Shady Characters
Fresh off their Swedish Apocalypse support slot with fellow countrymen Arch Enemy and The Haunted, Gothenburg melodic death metallers Dark Tranquillity return with their new album Character.
This album clearly flies the flag for the “Gothenburg sound” unlike their comrades in metal, Dark Tranquillity have splashes of synths and keyboards against the harsh textures of out and out thrash metal guitars of Niklas Sundin and Martin Henriksson and the growlings of Mikael Stanne.
Character is somewhat an album of two halves having the melodies of In Flames (ironically Anders Frieden featured on their debut album Skydancer) and the crunchy backbone of Arch Enemy. Opening track The New Build is a percussion-driven thrash anthem. Whilst songs like “Am I 1” and “The Endless Feed” have a symphonic backdrop amongst the organised chaos being delivered.
It is without a doubt a (dare I say) progressively heavy record without compromising on style or substance. A great effort and a superb record from one of the best metal scenes in Europe.