Album/EP

AMARANTHE – Maximalism (Album Review)

Gareth Williams

Senior Writer/Ranga

/10

Oct 23, 2016

7 min read

AMARANTHE – Maximalism

OUT Now

AMARANTHE Line Up:

Amaranthe Online:

http://amaranthe.se
www.facebook.com/AmarantheBand
http://instagram.com/amarantheofficial

That moment you're handed some new music, the excitement, the anticipation, settling into your favourite chair, putting on headphones to block out distractions of the outside world. Ready to immerse yourself into the next metal musical odyssey, you press play and… oh for the love of all things metal, make it stop!

A bit of an overreaction? Perhaps, but read on.

Amaranthe’s fourth release, Maximalism, kicks off with an example of the sort of mediocre techno heard in the worst clubs of Ibiza. Like Steve Aoki lost his MacBook Pro and, in desperation, pinched samples from a kid hustling CDs in Times Square.

Combining what I’ve just described with heavy guitars, drums and the unique triple threat vocal attack of Elize Ryd, Jake E. and Hendrik Wilhelmsson Englund you get an idea of what a confused mish-mash of pop and metal this album is.

What could have been the perfect mix of dance music and metal (think Rammstein) this effort sadly falls very, very flat indeed. All the ingredients are there to create something unique, except everything is thrown into the pot and mashed together with no thought to taste before serving it up. There’s no doubt Amaranthe are six very talented individuals, but in combination on this album it just doesn’t work.

With eleven of the twelve tracks hitting that magic three-minute radio friendly mark, I get the distinct feeling that with this album the band were trying to write a hit song. The second track ‘Boomerang’ is an example of this, sounding like a Hell-spawned mutation between Britney Spears and Bring Me The Horizon’s Oli Sykes. It’s unlikely to have you coming back for more.

You know what they say, though: opinions are like arseholes, everyone’s got one and this is mine.

Having said, that there’s enough mind numbing top 40’s pop elements on this album to potentially bring the mainstream success the band seems to be craving.

I’m giving Maximalism 4 ½ Barbie Girls out of 10