There's nothing new or surprising about extreme metal fans of the gothic scene, and many have already taken the plunge (Moonspell, Tribulation, Tiamat, Paradise Lost or even Cradle of Filth covering No Time to Cry...). Cemetery Skyline is a supergroup founded by hairy men accustomed to saturation, wicked riffs and conquering choruses. The cast includes the ubiquitous Mikael Stanne on vocals (Dark Tranquillity), Markus Vanhala on guitar (Insomnium), Santeri Kallio on keyboards (Amorphis), Victor Brandt on bass (Dimmu Borgir) and Vesa Ranta on drums (Sentenced). The whole band was in the mood to chill their blood... and shake their booty at the same time!
The mystery doesn't last long: from the very first moments of the title track that opens the album, it's clear that this Nordic Gothic is going to deliver one catchy anthem after another. The melancholy and sophisticated darkness are neither leaden nor disquieting, as Cemetery Skyline speeds along, ticking the boxes of a well-defined set of specifications. Following in the footsteps of The 69 Eyes, it's not because the pace slows down (When Silence Speaks, with its symphonic lamentations that could plunge into Swallow the Sun-style doom, or The Coldest Heart, whose piano elevates it to one of the album's finest moments) or the horizon gets heavier (the riffs of In Darkness) that we lose sight of its constant effectiveness. The body is there, the backbone is solid, and knowing how to give an impression of simplicity requires a mastery of the subject that these guys undoubtedly have.
While Cemetery Skyline quickly seizes our nervous receptivity with its energy and string of powerful hits, while it's useless to try and resist the heady Behind the Lie, while in its most successful moments the album recaptures a Type O Negative heaviness and a Sisters of Mercy sense of rhythm, we're also legitimately entitled to wonder in what frame of mind these musicians embarked on this adventure. Gothic rock for stadiums? Easy-listening with a touch of festive nostalgia? Why not? Perhaps Cemetery Skyline too often feels like a recreational project, a side-step in which a group of artists can indulge their more danceable, “mainstream” impulses and enjoy themselves without having anything other than their know-how and refreshing energy to bring to the genre. A no-holds-barred kind of thing. The question of soul then legitimately arises: what's left of the whole thing once you've played its addictive tracks over and over again?
Nevertheless, we can also applaud this attempt to avoid wallowing in nostalgia or gimmicks. Cemetery Skyline doesn't overplay its hand, and there's no need for grandiloquent, vampiric second-degree, despite the emotions infused by Stanne's decidedly excellent clean vocals. Nordic Gothic exudes a modern perfume and is never cheesy, despite its cinematic touches... Which we have every right to regret! Behind the immediacy and apparent ease of this dark rock, we can nonetheless appreciate all its little riches, from a synth here to a jazzier ambience there. Nordic Gothic is a very pleasant album, with no bloated, mythomaniacal pretensions, which carries us along with its ardour and sometimes dramatic allure, and never misleads us as to its content. We are now curious to see what Cemetery Skyline will come up with over the long term, once this first recreational try has been digested. In the meantime, let's appreciate this first album for what it is: a cold, dark party that doesn't bother with hypothetical tomorrows.
