Lacuna Coil 'Karmacode' review
Release date: April 2006
Label(s): Century Media
Duration: 47:28
Details
- Fragile
- To the Edge
- Our Truth
- Within Me
- Devoted
- You Create
- What I See
- Fragments of Faith
- Closer
- In Visible Light
- The Game
- Without Fear
- Enjoy the Silence
Review
The album kicks off with the heavy riffing
Fragile. Andrea's vocals feature
prominently in this song, with Cristina's reduced to almost
backing vocals during the chorus. The song is pretty basic
nu-metal American style alternative metal with
symphonic melodies and some nice exotic singing from
Cristina for the intro and bridge. Get used to those
guitars, you'll be spending a lot of time together in the
next 47 minutes.
To the Edge, while featuring the same slightly symphonic heavy riffing sound of Fragile, fares slightly better, if only because it brings Cristina's vocals a little bit more to the forefront.
It's followed by the single, Our Truth, which is probably the best original song on the album. It starts with a nice little eastern sounding melody, and before long there's more exotic wailing from Cristina.
Next up is the obligatory semi-acoustic ballad, Within Me. It's not bad, but it sounds far too derivative of other female fronted rock bands. All it needs is a piano and it's a Within Temptation song.
Devoted is bland beyond belief.
Cue more nice exotic singing from Cristina in You Create, which is an intro to the next song. What I See is at least an improvement over Devoted, but that's not saying much. At this point the repetitive and uninteresting guitar riffs are starting to irritate as well as bore.
Fragments of Faith sounds a bit like Our Truth, only not as good. That said, it's a fairly good song and compared to the last few.
Closer sounds really fresh in comparison. The chorus is especially catchy and the guitars aren't as annoying as in the other songs. One of the better songs on the album.
In Visible Light follows, and is also one of the better songs, thanks to some interesting music. It's a shame the vocals are very dull in comparison.
The next song, The Game is another fairly good song, with some interesting moments to it. Seems strange to hear a guitar solo on this album, and it sounds relatively okay.
Without Fear is a nice and mellow song sung mostly in Italian.
And finally, the album ends with a cover of Depeche Mode's Enjoy the Silence, and is one of the highlights of the album.
Conclusion
There's no other way to describe this album without using the word disappointing; although it does have some nice songs, particularly on the later parts of the album. While all the songs do sound polished and well made, they sound far too repetitive and, let's face it, nu-metal-y compared to their other albums. Hopefully Lacuna Coil will find their way for their next album, but judging by the the early success of Karmacode, they may decide to stay lost.
5/10