Tristania - World Of Glass review
| Band: | Tristania |
| Album: | World Of Glass |
| Style: | Symphonic gothic metal |
| Release date: | September 25, 2001 |
| A review by: | Sephiroth |
01. The Shining Path
02. Wormwood
03. Tender Trip On Earth
04. Lost
05. Deadlocked
06. Selling Out
07. Hatred Grows
08. World Of Glass
09. Crushed Dreams
10. The Modern End [Seigmen cover] [bonus]
What is gothic metal today? Is gothic a good female voice togheter with a male growling? Trisiania thinks so. Now at their third full-lenghth album (without considering the debut EP "Tristania") we can immediatly notice that they slightly changed their style: the artwork indeed transmits us (???) the sensation of a cold World Of Glass, but it has changed from the usual Gothic atmospheres.
Not bad, let's listen to the music. The first thing we notice ragards the male singer: the previous one (a good one I thought) has now been replaced by Ronny Thorsen, that, as we can read in the booklet "appears with kind permission from Trail of Tears" (the norwegian goth band of the good "Profundemonium"). His voice is good, harsh enough but his growling doesn't reach deep notes as well as the previous singer did. Concerning the clean male vocals we have even two other singer, but frankly I cannot distinguish one from the other?..anyway the clean voices are good: deep, sad as always?but nothing special. What shines the most is the cristalline voice of Vibeke Stene that gives us the usual incredible performance. I don't want to be too much critical but I anyway think that Liv Kristine and especially Sharon den Adel are one step above the others.
The musical stile follows and evolves the path taken by the previous "Beyond The Veil" in favour of a music which is more complex, in particular regarding percussion, and a heavy use of chorus. We also find the usual violins (but not as emotional as in "Widow's Weeds") and the slow acoustic parts too, but it all has this feeling of "already listened". They serve themselves now for the first time of a bit of electrical sound and filtered voices but they fuse well with the music.
So, what's wrong with this album? I dont' exactly know but it leaves me indiffernt, it has no shining parts nor a single outstanding song. It doesn't have the heavy power and the obscure mood of some songs from "Beyond The Veil" nor the melancholic atmospheres of "Widow's Weeds". This last one indeed is, in my opinion their best album, with a perfect balance of male and female vocals and of hard and slow parts.
If you loved the previous "Beyond the Veil" to madness, listen to this one too and I think you'll like it, but if you are searching for a good goth album of this kind, I suggest to search for "Widow's Weeds" or to turn your attention to other bands such as Theatre of Tragedy, or Within Temptation which are not known enough.
Written by Sephiroth | 12.06.2007
Rating:
8.0
8.0
|
Rating: 8.0 |
Third effort of one of the best gothic bands of Norway, with Mortem Veland gone, the questions popped out... Is it as good as Beyond The Veil? Is the band is taking a new direction?Electronic elements will take over as they did with Theatre Of Tragedy and Paradise Lost? Well, I'm gladly to say that yes, no and no! Yes is a very good album! (I don't know if better than Beyond The Veil though...]. No, the black/gothic/dark sound is still there! And NO there aren't any electronic elements present! . Read more ›› |
Comments
Comments: 10
Visited by: 78 users
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| Robstar Posts: 230  |
I don't really like this album... I prefer their old stuff like Widow's Weeds or my favorite Beyond the Veil... From this World of Glass my favorite two tracks are : Wormwood and Crushed Dreams! No my favorite album, I give it a 5 !
---- Nothing is unreacheable
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| AnGina-- Dark Phoenix Posts: 3555  |
Not really convincing.... As the old skull Tristania fan (meaning I love WW and BTV far more than their newer works) I must say WoG is a pretty darn good album! Much more decent than Ashes afterwards was, but less dynamic and atmospheric as the previous ones. Still, Ronny Thorsen did an amazing job as a vocalist, as well as did Osten and especially Vibeke. I am sorry, but not Liv Krtistine (whom I deeply admire and love as a singer) nor (and especially not!) Sharon den Adel can ever comapre to her (Sharon has a long way to go to be able to fall in the same league as Vibeke). WoG has great jewels to show, such as the opening The Shining Parh, Wormwood, Selling Out, Hatred Grows and the ending Crushed Dreams which is IMO one of the strongest and most deranged songs Tristania ever made. So, I'd give a fair 9 to performance, 7 for the songwriting, because on WoG I missed Veland's obscure romanticism as well as the new surrealistic thingie wasn't really convicing, 8 on originality because I still believe Tristania is the best and most original bands out in the flood of all gothic band nowadays + thez kept their typical sound on this album, the choirs, the symphonies, but nevertheless they could be even a bit more original, 9 on the production and that gives me the fair rating of around 8 there. 6? Oh hell no. 
---- You think darkness is your ally? You merely adopted the dark. I was born in it. Molded by it. I didn't see the light until I was a man. But it was nothing to me but blinding.
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| Bitch Boy Posts: 1353  |
I think 6 is a very low grade. I would give WoG 7.5. But I agree that BTB and WW are better albums. Anyway, Crushed Dreams and the title song WoG aren't that bad.
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| Jason W. Razorbliss Staff Posts: 3523  |
The rating is too low IMO, though I don't feel the CD is a 10. It's reviews like this that remind me that few listeners respect Tristania belief that evolution is equally important to great music. This disc had the unfortunate timing of being released while the band had a major member depart, and in that sense I feel the band pulled off a grand disc despite that. No Tristania disc has ever sounded like another, and WoG is just a progression of their ideas. 8 from me.
---- "After silence that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music." - Aldous Huxley
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| Katatronik Angel of Lust Posts: 1018  |
I don't agree with you, in my opinion this album is very good, especially for the atmospheres and the songwriting, really excellent... I love this album
---- "The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown." Howard Phillips Lovecraft
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| Damned-In-Black Posts: 212  |
I couldn't disagree more with certain points of this review. Not entirely sure where to start. Perhaps with the opening line, which doesn't seem to involve much thought. Ok, they have good (the best, in my opinion), female vocals, and male growls. So what? I don't think you actually made a point, there. Seeing Vibeke compared with Liv and especially Sharon Del Adel is a bit painful. As AnGina said... They're just not in the same league - but this, at least, can be put down to personal preference (though I do believe Vibeke is genuinely of higher quality, vocally). In essence, what this album provides is a logical progression from the past two, minus the influence of Morten. They didn't lose the plot until Ashes, and since picked up again somewhat with the latest. It's not as good as either of its predecessors, most definitely - very few albums in any genre have that quality, but it's still pretty damned good. I give it an 8, too. And the last comment also strikes me in a bad way. I won't bother commenting on Theatre of Tragedy, because while I respect their albums and influence, I've never really enjoyed them, myself. Within Temptation though, should not be mentioned in the same sentance as either of Tristania or the Theatre of Tragedy. The only similarity there is the presence of female vocals. P.S. Don't take this as argumentative - it's not intended as such, but probably comes across like that, anyway. Something in there just pushed my rant button 
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| dancingdecember Posts: 264  |
just a 0.5 more from within temptation's last album(and even it was 7 in the first place!).yeah right... "...or to turn your attention to other bands such as Theatre of Tragedy, or Within Temptation which are not known enough." not known enough?are you high my friend?  i wouldn't compare the rating with other bands and think its a rating between tristania albums, but in whole review you compared the bands so...
---- i'm super, thanks for asking
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| Rathma Account deleted |
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| Milena gloom cookie Staff Posts: 4603  |
Duuuuude. The spelling errors in this review.
---- 7.0 means the album is good
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