Band:	Anthemon
Album:	Dystopia
Style:	Symphonic doom metal
Release date:	2004
A review by:	Jeff

01. Above Us
02. Foretell Omega
03. Chatter Of The Tube
04. Recall The Absence
05. Tuned To A Dead Channel
06. La Chute De l'Architecte
07. Manifold Of ...
08. Serene Eves

Anthemon, one of the most promising French bands is back. After the total success with their last album Arcane in 2003, everybody was waiting their new release "Dystopia". The CD is now released through the French label Thundering Records, and I suppose that you want to know if it can confirm all our hopes? The answer is easy to give, yeah Dystopia is a great album and will be for sure, a total success?

Anthemon was in the past an Atmospheric/Doom Metal band. I use "was" only because the band did some important changes lately. The most important one is without any doubts the departure of the female singer who is now replaced by Loïc Malassagne. Yeah, no more female vocals on Anthemon songs but an excellent singer with a very particular voice that we can only find in the best Progressive and Heavy Metal bands. That's not really easy for me to describe his voice because he can have a lot of tonalities, but maybe I can say that he is not far of some "symphonic" vocals. And about vocals, I can't forget the Death ones [more in the true Doom spirit] by Marc, the bassist of the band. And then come the other important change of the band the musical style. Don't expect a radical turnover, but however "Dystopia" is really more symphonic. The arrangements are excellent, and all that with in addition the good voice by Loïc and the great grunts by Marc which give a lot to the music of the album.

The music of "Dystopia" is clearly Doom Metal [very melodic however] with slow tempo and very dark riffs but with a lot of Keyboards this album is not far to be "Progressive", and in my opinion that's a good thing because it's not very easy to find something original nowadays... And Doom, mixed with Symphonic music and some touches of Prog? no it's hard for me to remember a lot of bands we are able to produce such things.

But there is a very little problem for me which come from the Keyboards, if it's perfect for the majority of the time, sometime I regret some sounds which are a bit "cheesy"... Hoowever that's my only regret with this album then... I suppose that you understand the quality of this release...
Mixed and mastered at Tico-Tico [Finland] by Athi Kortelainen the sound of this album is really good. It doesn't suffer of any problems, and the quality of the cover and the booklet confirm my first opinion, Anthemon is a very good and professional band, and they really deserve all our respect.

"Dystopia" is a great album, something more than interesting to listen to. Original, with a great quality of composition, all the fans of Doom, but also the fans of "classic" Metal will be enchanted by this production. It's good for a French to see that our Metal bands are each days better and better, and of course that's the case of Anthemon.
If you like Doom, or if you only like beautiful music, no doubts !!! "Dystopia" must be featured in your Metal list to Santa for this Christmas 2004?