Artist: Essence of Mind
Title: Indifference
Genre: Electro/ Industrial / Drum ‘n’ Bass / Pop
Release Date: 18th May 2012
Label: Alfa Matrix
Album Review
Describing their sound as “a blend of electro, industrial rock, drum n bass, alternative and pop”, Norwegian act ESSENCE OF MIND offer up their third full length with a convincing sense of assurance, and despite the broad range of styles, a keen sense of their own identity. That isn’t to say they’re the height of originality: there’s nothing on ‘Indifference’ that hasn’t been done before, and their alignment with acts spanning PRODIGY, APOPTYGMA BERZERK, ZEREOMANCER, PENDULUM, LINKIN PARK and COMBICHRIST gives a fair indication of where they’re coming from. As such, the listener can get a fair idea of what to expect. What matters of course is the quality of the songwriting and performance, and this is where EOM definitely prove themselves worthy of note, sustaining an enviable density of hooks per song throughout and successfully varying the mood and tempo in order to maintain interest.
I might add to the list Pretty Hate Machine era NINE INCH NAILS and perhaps STABBING WESTWARD, albeit with a more overtly dance / pop sensibility. And that’s cool: they evidently appreciate that “catchy” isn’t a dirty word, but doesn’t have to equal mainstream. They step up the angst on ‘No Denial’ and rage hard but without sacrificing accessibility, and ‘Retreat’ is a tidy slab of industrial disco pop. The slow-burning closer, ‘In Line’ is marred a shade by some iffy and slightly dated sounding scratching, but it’s a comparatively minor detail. Less successful is ‘Some Kind of Entertainment’ a lot of bells whistles are melded to an urgent yet all too safe and cliché beat. Meanwhile, ‘Desperate Times’ kicks up a swinging PENDULUM style groove, and is, for my money, one of the album’s less impressive tracks, but with the stadium-filling techno-dance-rock duo no longer a going concern, there’ll be legions of fans looking for an act to fill their shoes: on the strength of this outing, ESSENCE OF MIND would be worthy successors. Anything but indifferent, that’s for sure.
Tracklist
01. The Opening
02. It's Killing You
03. Indifference
04. Some Kind Of Entertainment
05. In The Night
06. Scars
07. No Denial
08. Retreat
09. Aldri Mer
10. Desperate Times
11. In Line
Line-up
Erlend - vocals, music, lyrics, production
Alex - guitars
Christian - live keys
Website
http://www.essence-of-mind.com / https://www.facebook.com/essenceofmind
Cover Picture
Rating
Music: 7
Sound: 7
Total: 7 / 10
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