Reviewed - 04/21/05

Black Heart Process
[Deadsun Records]

Thank the Greek Gods that this friggin' band exists! Anyone that reads any of my reviews knows that I love bands that offer something more in their music, and the Greek band Ethereal Blue has released an album with so many new things to offer and an album full of well played unique Metal that it's going to be hard for anyone to pigeonhole them into one specific genre. Actually it'd be best if no one tried to categorize them as there's just too much going on within the music on their newest album "Black Heart Process" that to try and put them into one category would not be fair to the band that has obviously spent so much time coming up with so many new ideas. Right here in the beginning of this interview I must symbolically bow to Ethereal Blue for letting the world know a Metal band can be creative and inventive if they work at it. Just when you think Metal has hit a dead end, bands like this come along and shake things up and seem to revitalize the underground.

Ahh, so here we go... to try and describe this album, eh? Okay, for the most part "Black Heart Process" is an extremely melodic Black/Death Metal album. Aggressive and heavy for the most part, the album still reeks of sweet melody at all times. It's also very eclectic in that the time changes happen quite often and at odd times which makes the listener always say "Whoa, what was that? That was cool!". The band will be just beating out the Blackish Death metal and all of the sudden it will stop and there will just be drums, keyboards a piano and clean vocals playing. It's just so damn cool it's hard to explain. Aside from the Black and Death metal influences "Black Heart Process" also incorporates some orchestral, Doom Metal, Gothic and a tiny bit of classical music into their music via some well played keyboards, acoustic guitars and get this... a real deal Grand Piano. I just reviewed an album where a band used a synth to recreate the sound of a Grand Piano, but Ethereal Blue uses the real thing here on "Black Heart Process". With all of these styles merging and all of these instruments playing along, I guess you can call this album an "Art Black Metal" release for lack of a better term. Needless to say, every musician that lends their talents to this album is extremely professional sounding. I never hear a misplayed note nor do I hear any sloppy playing at all. Pure brilliance. If I had to compare Ethereal Blue's sound on this album to something that already exists it would be with the band Forgotten Silence, but still Ethereal Blue has their own sound.

The lyrics are where most of the "Goth" influence comes into play. Now don't think this is a traditional Goth band because it is a completely Metal band, but the lyrics would fit at home on any Goth album in my opinion as they seem to focus entirely on loneliness, despair and death. They are fairly well written though and don't come across as whiney like most Gothic Metal lyrics do. Epthimis, Ethereal Blue's vocalist is outstanding. He can sing in just about any style you can imagine from a Black Metal style to a more guttural Death Metal style to one of the better clean vocals styles I've heard in a year or so.

Part of this album was Recorded at Rock Sound Studios, so you know it's going to have a decent sound/production. I say part of this album was recorded here because the album was actually recorded at three different studios. Some vocals and instruments were recorded one place, the others at two different studios. George Brigos mixed and produced this album. I've never heard of him before, but he is apparently a highly regarded producer in Greece. I say he deserves the accolades because he got the production perfect for "Black Heart Process".

The packaging and layout is the one and only downfall of the whole thing. The cover art is just some blue colored painting that resembles abstract art, and the logo is pretty dull looking. The same goes for the inside of the booklet, but the inside does include all of the lyrics and a group photo of the band. The artwork on the back of the C.D. tray is what I think should have been used as the cover of the album. It's done in the same blue color scheme as the cover is, but this back cover art has an outdoor scene within it as well and is much more interesting.

I have this C.D. playing for about the sixth time in a row now as I sit here and review this album and I still can't believe how good the damn thing is. For a debut album, this is just unbelievably good. I recommend that anyone into Metal look into this album and buy it for yourself. There's so many different styles and new techniques to be found on this album that pretty much anyone into Metal will like this no matter what genre you're a fan of. Integrity in the Heavy Metal world is hard to come by these days. Sure there's a lot of good bands that play well and make good music, but most of them don't make music in their own style and fewer still sound different than everyone else like Ethereal Blue does. "Black Heart Process" is simply an amazing album and there's just not much more that needs to be said beyond that. Get this now.