Anthems of Rebellion
Track Listing:
1. Tear Down the Walls
2. Silent Wars
3. We Will Rise
4. Dead Eyes See No Future
5. Instinct
6. Leader of the Rats
7. Exist to Exit
8. Marching on a Dead End Road
9. Despicable Heroes
10. End of the Line
11. Dehumanization
12. Anthem
13. Saints and Sinners
Genre: Melodic Death Metal
This was my intro into Arch Enemy and melodeath as a whole. I was trying go find heavier music and bought "Metal for the Masses II" from Hot-topic and it included a lot of Arch Enemy (We Will Rise was track 2). From there I bought Anthems and loved every second of it. Im pretty sure I made my mom play it in the car everytime we went anywhere for months. I even had my MySpace page's custom link set to lyrics from this album. Let's see how it holds up
Tears Down the Walls - Intro track, ties in well
Silent Wars - This is the start of the super clean production they'll go to in later albums. Its not bad yet but clearer than Wages. Cool riff and Gossow sounds so good here. She improved immensely between albums. Great solo, almost reminds me of Holy Wars from Megadeth. That tremolo picked part right at the end of the solo is nuts. It's triplets (I think) and it almost feels off time but clearly isn't. So good
We Will Rise - My into to Arch Enemy and what a way to start. Gossow has learned how to handle the slower parts better. The verse is just slow growls but it works well. The electronics adds a lot of depth, which is needed under the simpler riffs. Epic chorus, excellent song. Cool solo
Dead Eyes See No Future - One of my favorite, that intro/verse riff is delicious. The chorus is infectious. I heard this one live and it was amazing. Also there's like 6 solos, all of which rip. Also it weirdly calls out Doomsday Machine, their next album and also name drops Marching on a Dead End Road which is later on the album.
Instincts - Electronic intro and chuggy riffs. This almost feels like it could fit on In Flames's Soundtrack to Your Escape (which came out year later). I like the slower pace and the electronic elements. Its well done like on Silent Wars
Leader of the Rats - Excellent riff, through the first verse it's almost and industrial song. Chuggy, circular riff that's repetitive in the best kind of way. The chorus kicks in and is great. Solo is a cool break
Exist to Exit - A slow burner of a song. Weird spoken work intro, it slowly builds up to the chorus, which heavier than the verses. They go with some simplistic palm muted riff for the verse, which I thought didnt work for them before but this time its much more fitting. And the Slayer-esque guitar howls to end the song is great
Marching on a Dead End Road - Instrumental. Acoustic guitar solo, that's pretty cool
Despicable Heroes - The heaviest song since Dead Eyes. Just a heavy riff fest from start to end.
End of the Line - One of my favorites on the album. That intro riff is excellent. Im so happy it comes back for the verse. Also, we get the first clean vocals from Christopher underneath Angela's in the chorus. Works very well
Dehumanization - They liked the soft/heavy chorus so much they decided to run it again. I agree it sounds cool but putting these two back to back was a mistake. Makes me feel like this is just a less good End of the Line
Anthem - Instrumental. Not as good as Marching
Saints and Sinners - Album closer, the intro riff is brutal and is much welcomed after the slower End of the Line and Dehumanization. I like the chorus, the verses are a little bland. The solo takes a bit of a weird turn. Not the best album closer but still a decent song
So as we reach the end, this album held up much better than I expected. Less technical than previous efforts, the solos are still great and the electronic elements are great. 8 green songs, no red. This might pass Wages of Sin as their best album
4.5/5
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