Edge of Sanity

After two semi-standard releases, Edge of Sanity proceed to show the metal world just what they're made of. Sporting an intensely thick sound which just dominates, The Spectral Sorrows takes the "Sunlight Sound" to new levels. Some thrash remains, but more emphasis is placed on melody, allowing songs to stand out easier, and providing more lines to hum along to. This pile of crusty genius does start to blend together after a few tracks, and that's exactly why we get two tracks from left field. Inserting an excellent cover of Manowar's Blood of My Enemies at slot 6 is a good change, also allowing Swanö the chance to show off his clean vocals. Back to the grind for a while, but then Sacrificed (which sounds like a cover, it's so different from the rest of the album) pops in, a quasi-electric dance number reminiscent of the "alternative" 80's. Good stuff. The band is also in top form, with guitar upon bass upon guitar layered like flapjacks, all driven by Benny Larsson's precision percussion. I have total respect for this guy, since you only notice that he doesn't use double bass when he does throw in a db phrase in "Across the Fields of Torment". The beginning of great things for this institutional metal band, whose stunning creativity would also be the cause of their ultimate split. A worthy beginning to Purgatory Afterglow.
8 1/2 out of 10

Always doing something a little different, these guys are. Edge of Sanity often walk the line (I won't make a pun with Edge) of cheesiness and brilliance, most of the time achieving what they set out to accomplish. Dan Swanö is indeed a brilliant arranger/producer, and the sound of this album shows that. The album starts out with this 80's keyboard love song intro, but then just cranks into one of the catchiest songs on the album. I remember when I first heard the intro, I was like, man, what is this crap? But the next day, I found myself humming along to it. This album has some real dark spots, but is in a pretty experimental vein, and may turn off the balls out total death or nothing crowd, but for everyone else, this is prime Edge of Sanity, and is highly recommeded. I love the guitar sound on this album. There's this dark, low B buzzsaw guitar used as the foundation which the melodic guitars are built on. This truly is awesome stuff, for after each listen, I hear the genius which resides in each composition.

9 out of 10

Crimson is Edge of Sanity's Finest Hour. Here they have accomplished what many seasoned musical "veterans" have tried and failed to do, create an epic, flowing, one song concept album. This album is simply amazing, forty minutes has never sliiped by so rapidly, so unnoticed. The production is impeccable, capturing every nuance, every note. There are so many elements present here, it's hard to dissect what to promote most. This record carries my highest recommendation, it is essential to any fan of melodic death metal.

10 out of 10

As I understand it, Edge of Sanity began to suffer from creative disputes, resulting in the dichotomous Infernal. Looking at who plays what here, it's pretty obvious that Swanö played the Swanö tracks, and Dread et al. took the reigns on the Axelsson penned tracks. I say dichotomous as the two writing styles are completely different, with Swanö handling the melody, Dread the intensity. While this fused to brilliant results on the last three releases, here the two separated styles break the flow of the album, taking it down a notch. Some of this is evened out by Peter Tägtgren's excellent production, but in the end we're left with a band split at the seams. Don't get me wrong, this is still Edge of Sanity, and there are some excellent tracks here, making this a must have, but I pine for the days of yore, when EOS were at their peak. Not really much different from past releases, just maybe not as strong. After this release Swanö left the band to pursue several successful projects, with the rest of the band enlisting a new singer and continuing on.
8 out of 10