Damage Done

Dark Tranquillity is amongst my favorite melodic death metal bands (with In Flames, At The Gates, Soilwork). They have opened the road many years ago ... used today by bands like Soilwork, Killswitch Engage or Darkane. Aggressive, fast and melodic at the same time, this is how I would described this Swedish sound. Of course, Metallica is not that far (the thrash influence), but that's another story as I am not here to make you a lesson about the Gothenburg sound, you already know the story. What you want to know is how Damage Done sounds ? Well well well my friends, it sounds back to the roots ... the real roots of Dark Tranquillity. I have nothing against Projector or Haven - I found them both excellent - but these records highlighted the gothic side of the force and as I am a fan of aggressive melodic death metal, I am really happy to see the band back to their original path. Of course, Damage Done is full of sounds used on Projector & Haven - and somehow still sounds gothic - but this time the aggressive vocals are back giving much power & light to the record. To be honest with you, I haven't listen to something as good as Damage Done since Clayman (In Flames) that it makes me say Dark Tranquillity is about to reconquer the melodic death metal throne. Don't ask me to choose for a song, I can't. Every track is special, every track is a killer. The only thing I can tell for sure is the performance of the singer : he will devastate your brain. No more clean vocals, no more gothic things ... here comes hate & aggression. Damage is done ! I am "smashed" by the sound, the song-writing, the unbelievable melodies and structures developed by the band. God, I though Soilwork released the ultimate melodic thrash/death album of the year ... and Dark Tranquillity comes with this fist in my face. Hell this band is dark, but forget about the tranquility : here every song is powerful, progressive, thrashy, heavy, fast, melodic and the song-writing, which seems so easy, is in fact complex ... a treasure of complexity. Except very few bands - I am thinking of Samael, In Flames or Soilwork, this type of ultimate aggression & melodic death/thrash metal is untouchable. A wonderful piece of melodic death metal, a wonderful ride. I am gonna rush my ass on the limited edition which contains one bonus track and one video track.