Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
Freedom is the ultimate aim of all creatures, whether it is the brutal, the passionate, or even in the ability to remove yourself from what bound you to this earth, the chains that held you, maybe mentally keeping you in your place, perhaps shackling you to the comfortable and familiar in a way that would not permit growth beyond your perceived vision.
It is to freedom that we strive, but the cost of such liberty is that, like the Phoenix, we are forever burning ourselves to be reborn, for freedom is a spark that demands constant feeding, and if we do not acknowledge such hunger, we are doomed to repeat our cause forever, because we have not installed the belief in others, we have been neglectful and thought only of ourselves as we slipped the metal shackles.
Swedish Progressive Metal band Evergrey tackle the planned Escape Of The Phoenix in their 12th studio album, and it one of poignant reminder to the way the world has become its own cell in the last year, admittedly one with peace of mind that if we can adhere to a new way of thinking then we can return to what we had before. However, in that shift, the dichotomy of what the overused phrase of normality means, what it represents, for as the Phoenix dies in flames and is then returned to being as an egg, so should we now return ourselves to a younger state and demand change for the better, not to return to what was, but to escape, to be the phoenix who refuses to be reborn in the same continual manner.
To break the shackle of adulation is also one to which praise of the band as they move away from the popular and admired conceptual trilogy that has brought them tremendous support over the last few years, and instead embrace the new, still bearing absolute pleasure in their delivery, but one unhindered by the continuous cycle of drama and thinking of what others expect.
The album bares its fruit in the tracks Where August Mourns, Dandelion Cipher, Eternal Nocturnal, Leaden Saint and the tremendous In Absence Of Sun, and whilst the album is still a progressive journey, it is one with a different outcome, the roadmap displays an altered path, the sense of new beginnings being unfurled from the wrapper is seismic.
Thanks arguably to Time’s presence in our current lives, the shackles are there to be unburdened, perhaps not with the eye of low expectations on everybody’s mind, but with the chance to walk into the fire of human endeavour and creative freedom, and begin anew, to resurrect with memories intact but with a different perspective on how to live this time round. It is a fire born with melancholic brilliance by Evergrey and Escape Of The Phoenix.
Evergrey release Escape Of The Phoenix on February 26th via AFM Records.
Ian D. Hall