Sentenced - North From Here (1993)^{Release ID: 6589}

Surprisingly great death metal with more than a touch of melodic black metal.

What a huge surprise this album is! I've heard several Sentenced albums over the years, and I can't say I've really enjoyed any of them. The debut album was average death metal that didn't really do much for me and the later gothic albums I've checked out were quite frankly a bit crap. The vocalist on those latter offerings is awful and I find it hard to understand the fascination with the band. Anyway, I guess I expected North From Here to be somewhere in between the average death metal of the debut and the average gothic rock of later years. Instead what I find is a cracking album that's as much black metal as it is death metal!

North From Here sounds a bit like the combination of At the Gates, Dissection and Dimmu Borgir which is so far away from what I was expecting. The riffs switch between great tremolo picking and shredding sections with ease and vocalist Taneli Jarva (also the bass player) has a fantastic black metal styled venom that's perfect for the complex death and black riffs that fill this album. The drumming is for the most part excellent and the production is top notch as well so overall, I have to wonder why this album hasn't been given more praise, particularly when you consider it was released in 1993! Highlight tracks for me are My Sky is Darker Than Thine, Awaiting the Winter Frost and closer Epic. If you're at all into the more melodic (but still intense) side of death and black metal, then you should check this album out. Don't be put off by the name Sentenced adorning its cover.