While many bands struggle with the compromise between the brutal crushing factor of heavy guitar riffs, and the beauty of higher melodies, Empyrean Eclipse has found an illuminating balance in their melodic death metal. Illumination Undone is an extremely driving album which you won't be able to keep too far away from your ears. This album is almost addicting it's so good. One song leads to the next with furious beats, passionate and intricate guitar melodies, and guttural low vocals, with occasional higher screams.
One thing that sets Empyrean Eclipse apart from other melodic death metal bands, is the catchyness of their guitar-work. You'll be humming these melodies for a while after you've heard the album, yet they never seem cheesy or melodramatic at all. Their approach to melodic death metal borders on the black metal side much of the time with fast drumming and tremoloed riffs being their favored assault. Empyrean Eclipse definitely listens to a lot of Swedish metal and it really shines through their music. While a lot of American metal is lacking in some area or another, this band is always at full strength; there are no half-assed melodies, no whiny singing, and no metalcore breakdowns to distract from this Swedish metal, straight from Colorado.
Almost halfway through the album is the beautiful classical piano interlude “Forgotten,” complete with synth strings and thunderclaps in the background. This break serves to divide up the album into before and after. While the four songs before it are fantastic, the five after it have a tiny amount of extra power.
The replay value of this album is phenomenal, just as their live shows used to be. It seems that the band is reforming, so keep your eyes open for any news of shows and new material. Until then just listen to “Infinite Darkness,” the seven minute epic that brings such a great album to a close, and then start the disc back on track one.
9/10
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