In This Moment - Beautiful Tragedy [2007]

Mention the phrase "woman" in the context of a metal band, and most people will probably laugh or snort in disdain at the mere mention of a female being in a metal band.

There are a handful of successful females in metal. Bands like Nightwish, Lacuna Coil, Otep, Walls of Jericho are all fronted by women. They all have considerable fanbases, and great albums.

In This Moment should be placed right alongside these well-known female fronted bands.

In This Moment, admittedly, does not do anything particularly new on their debut album Beautiful Tragedy. But it how well they combine elements of metal and rock to create an album that is not only beautiful, but brutal at times.

What makes In This Moment so good is their ability to seamlessly move from pounding metal riffing into sing-along choruses. There may be plenty of people who decry the use of singing in today's metal, but frontwoman Maria Brink's singing voice is nearly angelic at times. She sings with passion, with fire, and desire. She may not have the vocal capabilities of Cristina Scabbia or even the range of Amy Lee, but she her vocal melodies flow extremely well over the pulsating rhythms beneath her.

The guitar work is a mix of Unearth-like brutality - dual guitars that chug away with blistering riffs, fast harmonized passages and the occasional solo - to what I can only describe as straight up rock playing. That is, their choruses are often, though not always, simple, fast-ish strumming patterns. This allows for Maria to sing high and mighty over it all, and it's good that they let as previously mentioned. Drumming on this album is pretty much standard metal fare with lots of double bass, snare hits and crashing cymbals while the bass does it's job of getting lost in the mix more often than not.

The low point of the album, besides the bass playing or lack thereof is potentially Maria's screaming. There are plenty of times where one might, or will, cringe when she screams. Sometimes it appears as if she is straining to scream, or is not quite hitting higher notes that she wants to hit. Her screaming voice is certainly something of an acquired taste. I'm sure it will not please many metal purists/fans/whatever, but I strongly feel that the rest of the album is great enough to overlook her occasional foray into sounding like a Harpy.

Standout tracks on this album would include Prayers, an upbeat, fast paced number with great singing in the verse, Beautiful Tragedy with a wonderful clean guitar intro, is certainly the most 'rock' oriented song on the album, Daddy's Falling Angel which is an ***-kicking ride throughout, and Next Life which is arguably the heaviest, or at least the second heaviest track on the album.

To sum up: They may not be breaking any new ground here, but the path they are following is certainly an enjoyable mix of singing and headbanging along.

Tracklist:
1. In This Moment - Whispers of October (01:06)
2. In This Moment - Prayers (03:46)
3. In This Moment - Beautiful Tragedy (04:01)
4. In This Moment - Ashes (03:51)
5. In This Moment - Daddy's Falling Angel (04:12)
6. In This Moment - The Legacy of Odio (04:07)
7. In This Moment - This Moment (03:58)
8. In This Moment - Next Life (03:58)
9. In This Moment - He Said Eternity (03:51)
10. In This Moment - Circles (04:11)
11. In This Moment - When the Storm Subsides (04:44)

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In This Moment - The Dream (2008)

With 'Beautiful Tragedy' the year 2007 turned out quite succesfull for In This Moment. Basically, it's a pretty young band, founded in 2005, though that does not have to mean a lot. Their major debut was solid and is still a fun listen. Metalcore with female vocals is not really a brand spanking new invention, but it's still a bit unusual. A pleasing singing voice with quite powerful shouts, combined with typical metalcore-rythms and arrangements, that was In This Moment anno 2007. With 'The Dream' the band presents their follow up album, which fans and critics alike are looking forward to and wonder how it actually turns out.

More or less the album follows an Alice in Wonderland scheme. The intro 'The Rabbit Hole', the artwork overall but especially the promotion pictures with singer Maria Brink suggest that. The songs and lyrics relate to everyday situation and topics like life on tour, love and the like. Not really different to the precessor. But, what the listener will notice on the first spin through: the way the lyrics are presented has changed a lot. Shouts and screams are almost completely gone, apart from two songs all vocals are clean. From all the songs, 'The Great Divide' resembles the style of the former album the most, and also the small breakdown-ish part in 'Her Kiss' hints toward that style. The rest of the vocals are 100% clean though. This is not really a bad thing, as the voice of Maria Brink is not bad. Some fans will miss the combination of clean female vocals and shouts, which was obviously for many the interesting part about the band. If all this is change for the better will be up to personal taste.

The vocals are not the only thing that changed, as the general sound of the band has moved away form metalcore, breakdowns and similar song elements. The guitarists Chris Howorth and Blake Bunzel have found the old treats of metal and rock, and construct a sound that reminds of hard rock and old-school heavy metal. A lot. Overall everything sounds more rock-like, every now and then paired with classic guitar solos or leads. The songs got catchier, almost with plain pop-appeal. Which the rythmsection reflects as well. We have a solid foundation here, but drummer Jeff Fabb keeps a more low profile compared to previous efforts. The same goes for bassist Jesse Landry. A very good example for the new style is the opener 'Forever', which is available for streaming on the bands MySpace page for quite a while now. Catchy riffs, almost siren-like vocals. The perfect single. Like mentioned earlier, most similar to the songs on 'The Beautiful Tragedy' is 'The Great Divide'. It showcases the combination of clean vocals, shouts, driving double-bass, heavy riffs and hymn like parts fans liked about the older songs of the band. If that will be enough to please their old fans, is yet to be seen. In the more rock-like context the ballad 'Into The Light' does not feel as misplaced as it may have before. It shows the voice Maria Brink accompanied by piano and string arrangements. This really supports her voice, a little pause, stepping on the brakes. It's actually very pleasing.

Still, it's yet to be seen how the overall work will be recieved. Some will surely say it's too mellow and rock-like. Not enough shouts and heavy passages. Others will welcome the more mellow stance, incorporating more rock and classical metal elements, which makes it overall more accessible. If you're in the former or latter group after the dreamy sounds of the title track, will be up to personal taste. It's a fact though: with 'The Dream' the band emerges from the swamp of metalcore-like bands, and presents a quite entertaining metal/hard-rock album. The more dominant clean vocals, the sometimes sophisticated guitar riffs showcase some of the bands better qualities. Overall it's not ground breaking, but solid.

If you wanna spare a listen, try these songs: 'Forever', 'Her Kiss', 'Lost At Sea'.

Tracklist:
1. The Rabbit Hole ( 1:00)
2. Forever ( 4:21)
3. All For You ( 4:55)
4. Lost At Sea ( 3:46)
5. Mechanical Love ( 3:37)
6. Her Kiss ( 4:30)
7. Into The Light ( 4:12)
8. You Always Believed ( 3:40)
9. The Great Divide ( 4:11)
10. Violet Skies ( 3:56)
11. The Dream ( 4:42)

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