Sentenced

Amok (Century Media)
by Chaz Thorndike

With a queasy feeling, I notice powermetal is resurfacing. Ronnie J. Dio’s albums are having the dust blown off them, Yngwie (drop the J.) Malmsteen is getting his ass kicked less and less often for being an arrogant pussy, and it’s only a matter of time before puffy-headed, spandex-clad boyz that misspell würds start warbling about dragons and enchanted places in dickless falsetto…

Thank God Sentenced has some balls. Coming from the super-riff background of extreme hatred, they could only mellow so much before they began to hate themselves more than the topics they snarled about. Bassist/vocalist Taneli, in a moment of thoughtful lucidity stated, “It’s not as aggressive as North From Here [their last release], but twice as negative.”

Musically, Amok slows the tempo and explores a much more intricate melody conceptualization than before. Guitarist Milka is now allowed to roam freely, letting rip some scaling solos, screeching harmonics, dreamy mood movements in minor keys, and anthemic powerchords to rival any hard rock band. While they don’t credit a keyboardist anywhere that I can see, they toss in some doomy underlying orchestration and the occasional explosion, church bells, and waves-crashing-on-the-rocks sound effects commonplace in heavy metal. (I bite my pen each time I write those words.)

Tucked in there somewhere was a woman’s voice used in much the way Tom G. Warrior (or current name variation) offsets his I-gargle-with-broken-glass vocals with an angelic female touch. Milka’s guitar work is so frighteningly convincing that I heard hints of Rush, Accept, Y & T’s “Mean Streak” (Oh God!), lush classical masturbation, clever sing-along riffs that Helloween would get wet over, and sway-inducing, fist-in-the-air powermetal melody that would fit neatly on the Top Gun soundtrack or Metallica’s last album – all without making me the least bit nauseated.

Sentenced is from Finland, by the way, and all the band member’s names favor vowels over consonants. They’re currently touring Europe with Tiamat, who’re from Germany and also worth listening to.