Edge of Sanity - When All Is Said (2006)^{Release ID: 611}

"When all is fire and flaming air. When all is said and all is done. Beneath the ground, and man lies dead. When all the earth is a cold grave and no more brave." It is a quote to remember from this Edge of Sanity track that somehow didn't end up in this compilation despite sharing the same name...

Edge of Sanity is one of the leading bands of Swedish melodeath, though there's never as much credit for that band developing the genre as the Gothenburg trio (At the Gates, Dark Tranquillity, In Flames). When All is Said compiles tracks from all major releases, two per album. The second disc has the two Crimson albums/suites that were shortened slightly to fit in the 80-minute CD limit. The edited versions would later be split into several tracks (not according to lyrical movements) for streaming services.

"Tales" starts the first disc and the song's original album Nothing but Death Remains with a spooky keyboard intro before progressing into raw death metal heaviness. The production is a bit poor, but the track is nice and decent. Something to note about the first minute of "Human Aberration" is how faulty volume control is in the production. The guitars and bass still please me despite the lack of proper delivery. The Unorthodox section kicks off with the diverse "Enigma", which introduces a melodic section complete with clean singing. "In the Veins/Darker than Black" starts slow with heavy riffing, then founder Dan Swano starts growling through the verse with fast drumming. The song keeps switching from melody and brutality before heading into groove/thrash metal followed by blasting black metal. More promising variety than "Enigma"!

"The Masque" has some melodic groove-ish verse riffing that springs to mind melodic death 'n' roll. The Spectral Sorrows is where Dan was really thinking outside the box with his deathly style. "Lost" has some catchy greatness in the structure. The title track of the EP Until Eternity Ends has nice dynamic melody. The gothic singing hinted in The Spectral Sorrows is quite interesting while staying in character with the sound. This different direction is tested out again in "Eternal Eclipse" with more rock-out melody. Having almost forgotten about Purgatory Afterglow after my last listen a few years ago, that album's opener "Twilight" almost caught me off-guard with its synth/vocal intro when checking out this compilation. There is catchy progressive action in the riffing with cool vocals. There's also a bit of death-doom to remind some of Novembers Doom. Then halfway through is a soft spoken passage. "Will we ever meet again?... NO!!!" Then we have "Black Tears", an interesting song relying on clean singing.

We skip ahead to Infernal with the song "15:36" in which Dan explores the bluesy tendencies of his other band Nightingale. One track that barely gets mentioned is "Hell is Where the Heart is" which takes on the usual sound of Edge of Sanity but more melodic. It just goes to straight to destructive riffing and growls without any keyboards or cleans. And d*mn, the soloing is quite killer! On the other hand, "Hell Written" isn't that strong. It's from the only Edge of Sanity album without Dan, Cryptic. Despite that, it twists into a softer Opeth-like bridge without having to be a 10+ minute epic. "Bleed You Dry" is an amazing track with the last bit of the band's strictly deathly achievements.

And now we get to the "Crimson" epics, starting with the first one. It starts slow and doomy in the first two minutes, then speeds up into the fast melodic main riff. Then it quiets down and builds back up in heaviness back and forth, with incredible doomy black metal-ish tremolo near the 8-minute mark. Then the switch from quite to heavy keeps coming until over the 13-minute point with a sinister melodic march, followed by rapid-fire blast-beats and another groove-ish section before f***ing catchy riffing melody close to the 16-minute mark. Now let's skip ahead through the rest of the greatness until 28 minutes in when a softer verse is abruptly cut by one of the greatest screams I've heard in death metal followed by one of the greatest guitar solos I've heard in death metal. After some more speed, once we reach 32 and a half minutes, there's a layered vocal acapella verse before returning to the suite's main riff and the last bit of the heaviness/melody before ending it all right at 40 minutes (originally). And finally we have the 43-minute "Crimson II". This is too massive for me to describe in words, though the best part for me is all that melody between the 3-minute and 6-minute mark.

Anyone new to Edge of Sanity can check this compilation out and explore the different eras of the band. The die-hard collectors might also want this release too. For me, it's a nice throwback to this band I listened to when I was still heavily into melodeath. A solid way to get into all that Dan Swano and co. have said and done.....

Favorites (one per original album): "Tales", "In the Veins/Darker than Black", "The Masque", "Until Eternity Ends", "Twilight", "Hell is Where the Heart is", "Bleed You Dry", "Crimson", "Crimson II"