Halo Effect, The - March of the Unheard (2025)^{Release ID: 56963}

For a record being published through Nuclear Blast, March of the Unheard is a remarkably clean sounding death metal album. The guitars and bass have just enough grit to give these tracks some much needed excitement because the songwriting surely does not. The Halo Effect is a Swedish supergroup of In Flames alumni and you would think that with this kind of starpower, that The Halo Effect would be a little bit more interesting?

There are pockets of quality within March of the Unheard but they are drowned out by a very uninspired palette. I get a lot of modern Arch Enemy influence out of this album and even some newer Dark Tranquility. But the record feels like it lacks direction. Considering how much In Flames background there is, I don't hear much The Jester Race, or Whoracle, or even Clayman. If anything, this record sounds closer to the In Flames of the 2010s; alternative metalcore. The album feels monotonous and would have benefited from having a key change or a guitar solo once in a while...which is why it's so baffling that the record DOES have these modulators. March of the Unheard feels to me like an album that thinks it can draw you in on name alone (it did for me) and nothing else. 

Best Songs: Cruel Perception, Forever Astray, Between Directions