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Within Temptation - The Heart of Everything

Following up The Silent Force was going to be a monumental task, as amazing as that album was. But Within Temptation’s latest album, The Heart Of Everything, though with fewer standout songs, does a great job overall.

The Howling had me worried at first: It’s an alright song, but her vocals are going the way of Amy Lee’s in the new Evanescence album: rougher and more masculine. I didn’t like The Open Door at all, but WT quickly redeemed themselves with their first single from the album, What Have You Done, featuring Keith Caputo. His voice is perhaps a bit poppish for what I would expect from Within Temptation - I was hoping for something deeper, maybe even growling a la Jane Doe, but the song is nevertheless catchy, and their voices combine very nicely.

Frozen comes in more sadly and slowly, but no quieter. Vocally, it’s the most emotionally charged so far, but it’s not too amazing. Our Solemn Hour, though, is by far the best track on the album. Latin chanting, sound bytes from old-sounding documentary recordings, and of course the grinding melodicism make for an archetype of everything amazing about goth rock.

The title track, The Heart of Everything, brings back Sharon’s rougher and more masculine vocals from the first track in double force from before. It stands out to me as probably the weakest track to this point. But next comes the infectious beat and grandiose synths of The Hand of Sorrow, a song you just can’t sit still to. Though different rhythmically from any of their previous work, it’s a strong track and one of the best on the album.

The Cross is another of the strongest tracks on the album. It took a few listens for me to get used to it, but the punctuated voice effect really isn’t irritating at all anymore. It’s thematically similar to Destroyed and is filled with Christian imagery, though the Judas reference seems forced. The melody is powerful, and the vocals, though different from anything yet, fit the mood well throughout. Final Destination then is a pretty good song, but it doesn’t stand out a lot. The chorus seems to linger too long in the high note jumps, diminishing the effect of its climax

All I Need starts out with a nice sounding acoustic section, and turns later into a poignant ballad, something that might appear closer to the mainstream. Not that that’s a bad thing; the melody is emotional and the softer instrumentation rising at the end brings the song to a tear-jerking climax. The Truth Beneath the Rose is the obligatory song-making-a-point, this time about injustices done in the name of religion. Whether that is, as it states, Holy wars, or more personal wrongs as in Destroyed, it’s definitely an interesting listen. It’s by far the longest song on the album clocking in over 7 minutes, but surprisingly for something that long, it at no point gets boring or old.

The album ends on a soft note with Forgiven, a piano-driven song lyrically ambiguous as to whether she’s asking for forgiveness or forgiving someone else (actually, it seems pretty unambiguous in both directions, so I dunno). It’s an appropriate closing for such an energetic album.

The Silent Force from the beginning was going to be a hard album to top - it is, actually, one of my favorites. But The Heart Of Everything is a masterful followup with several amazing songs that more than make up for the filler.

• This entry was posted on Friday, March 23rd, 2007 at 11:45 am and is filed under Music & Media. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS feed. You can leave a response using the form below.

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