Amaranthe - Helix (2018)^{Release ID: 5496}

The 3 trance metal blades continue circling in a helix with the fifth album from electro-metal powerhouse Amaranthe, Helix! Female singer Elize Ryd once again inherits many of the vocal talents dynamically harmonized by male growler Henrik Englund and male singer Nils Molin to keep the helix of Amaranthe's music spinning.

Yep, they have a new male singer, Nils Molin (from heavy metal band Dynazty), replacing Jake E. who left the band the previous year. The band's fifth album Helix can be a rapid treat for any fan or just trance overload. First starting as a melodic metalcore/power metal act, album after album they keep adding more pop energy, sounding like Babymetal if they're 15 years older, two of the vocalists are male, and one of them growls. Either way, get ready for some electro-metal jamming to both love and hate!

Opener "The Score" is a full-steam charger with the band's entire metal arsenal thrown together with pop-fused electronic beats. The vocal triptych of Ryd, Molin, and Englund adds greater excitement than ever. "365" is basically a poppy fusion of EDM (electro-dance-metal), sounding too much like if Ariana Grande made a guest appearance in that Korn album The Path of Totality. Not at all a great track, but still way better than that other "365" song by Zedd and Katy Perry. "Inferno" flips out through industrial groove metal with jackhammer-like drumming and a merely-serving swift-changing platform for the vocal sections. The pounding rhythm throughout "Countdown" is pretty catchy, and even though Elize Ryd sounds too much like Lady Gaga sometimes there, she can still transition her mood at ease.

The title track sounds more related to mid-2000s In Flames. I like that a bit! "Dream" is more dreamy, but the sped-up singing in the verses and Englund's growls sounding more like rapping similar to Mushroomhead makes the song become a little too surreal. "GG6" is the heaviest song on this album, though the heaviness is not used in the way metalheads wanted, ending up with an omnipresent breakdown dragging through metalstep. Not quite a "GG" there. "Breakthrough Starshot" has some of the hardest groove for this album through a techno beat. I actually like it slightly better than most of the songs so far in the album.

More of the original metal commitment from Amaranthe can be heard in "My Haven". Same with "Iconic", a pleasant surprise for heavier metalheads, running wild through hyperspeed melodic thrash and powerful choruses. The 4-minute power ballad "Unified" kinda works, but still not totally great. After all that diversity, "Momentum" is an excellent comeback to the sound of their first couple albums, displaying their heavier passion that has never withered. An excellent song to go out in a metal bang!

Metalheads might think of Amaranthe as a b****rd hybrid of metalcore and electro-dubstep, but Helix is a well-polished album with at least something to admire whether you like it or not. While this ultra-hybrid might be too much to digest, Amaranthe continues to invite millennials into a thrill ride filled with exploding senses of diversity....

Favorites: "The Score", "Helix", "Breakthrough Starshot", "My Haven", "Iconic", "Momentum"