Ophelia’s Breath hails from Stary Oskol, Russia and their debut EP New World delivers us some pretty crushing deathcore. Upon listening to the album I’m immediately reminded of Make Them Suffer, Born Of Osiris, and All Shall Perish. They have a similar situation to Make Them Suffer actually. They are a budding deathcore group, on Roadrunner’s Sign Me To list, with a fantastic debut EP. Here is to hoping things end up as good for these guys as it did for Make Them Suffer.
Now let us get on to the music shall we? The band is labeled as progressive deathcore, and for good reason. They have a nice combination of solid guitar works and plenty of keyboards. The majority of their guitar work is in the rhythm guitars but it feels like smarter than average chugs and riffs. The track “Black Sunset” is one of my favorites, because it’s got some pretty catchy chugs and some interesting things going on with the lead guitar in the background. We also get a pretty solid solo in the second track “When The Second Is Eternity”.
The keyboards often serve as orchestral backgrounds to each song, which add a great atmosphere to the album as a whole, and the keys almost replace the lead guitar work at times. The end of the first track “Rome” sounds very similar to the style of interludes Born Of Osiris employs, using keyboards and electronic drums.
There’s not a whole lot I can say about the lyrics because they are in Russian, and I also didn’t have a written version of them to poorly translate with google translate, which likely wouldn’t have done any justice to them. I can say though that the vocal style reminds me of Hernan Hermida from All Shall Perish at times, with a bit more emphasis on mixing them with high screams. It’s a really good mix of high and low vocals and one of the best parts of this band.
The title track is a really solid end to the album as well. The combination of chugs and keyboards makes it feel rather epic all throughout. It’s got a high energy feel to it, but remains as brutal as the rest of the tracks.
Of all the praise I can give this album, I must point out my one flaw with it, which lies in the fact that it’s rather short. It clocks in at just under seventeen minutes. I know it’s an EP, but it feels really short. It’s a really solid seventeen minutes, I just wish it could have been a tad longer. It does however only make me want these guys to get a record deal to see how they could do when working with ten or more tracks.
These guys show great promise, and have already created a very tight sound for themselves. The only thing I would hope for on a full length album is a bit more length to each song and possibly more lead guitar work here and there. These guys should have a bright future ahead of themselves.
Ophelia's Breath - New World,
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Alex I'm a Film student with a passion for Metal. I enjoy most every form of metal, and I love finding new artists. I'm always open to new music!
