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Poisonblack
Escapextacy
The name alone caught my interest. Then when I found out that Ville Laihiala, singer for Sentenced, was in the band I knew I would have to have the CD. Ville isn't singing on this album though, he plays guitar. At first I was a little disappointed by this information, but this didn't last long as I found that J.P. Leppäluoto, singer for Charon, is handling the vocals. Both are excellent Finnish metal bands.
Poisonblack, while a bit gloomy (who would expect this from Sentenced or Charon??) also sound almost positive. The lyrics are of course somewhat depressing, but the music is a little lighter than Sentenced music giving the songs a more hopeful melancholy feel rather than the utter despair evident on Sentenced releases. Not that I'm complaining about utter despair, I relate to it well.
Some people may disagree, but I believe Sentenced is directly responsible for this trend in gloomy Finnish music. Their success has legitimized this type of music. Now you have bands like Charon, For My Pain, and H.I.M. following in their footsteps. For now, most of this music is pretty good. Eventually I see it getting played out like all good things, and that will be a sad day.
This is a good album to listen to while sitting around feeling self pity about your pathetic and miserable love life. I've tried it out, it works pretty good. Misery loves company and this disc can commiserate with those of us poor luckless fools that happen to be suffering from ailments of the heart. "Love Infernal" says it all: "To live in desire is to play with the fire." How true, how true.
So what do you want to know about this album? Is it good? Yes. Should you buy it? Yes. Should you tell your friends about Poisonblack so they can buy the CD too? Yes. Since getting this CD it has become an essential part of my collection and is never very far from hand. Sure, maybe the hard core death and black metal fans might think this is a wimpy sell out kind of album, but aren't those self righteous purists just a little bit annoying anyway?
I just heard the other day that J.P. is leaving Poisonblack at the end of their tour to devote his time to Charon. That's too bad, because Poisonblack are an excellent band. Maybe Poisonblack gave Charon the extra recognition that they needed to boost their career. Maybe not, Charon IS good enough to stand on its own. But working with Ville certainly brought them to more people's attention. I look forward to the next Charon release, and wonder what will become of Poisonblack?
