Cipher System "Central Tunnel 8" CD
[Lifeforce]
Despite the fact that this Swedish act has been around for almost 10 years (originally under the name of Eternal Grief), this is only their debut full-length! Well, they must have been doing something worthwhile in all that time, because even though this is a very typical melodic Swedish death metal record, it's also incredibly good for the genre. Stylistically it's very similar to Dark Tranquillity and In Flames in their late-90's prime blended with the more "modern" edge of Soilwork, offering up tons of lightly thrashy riffing with shitloads of slick dual guitar harmonies, faint smatterings of synths for additional texture, etc. The vast majority of the vocals are straight up sneering screams very much in line with the country's finest, only adding smooth singing vocals in rare cases (playing a very secondary role), and I actually find the keyboards to be very well handled - they're never distracting and the tones fit the music nicely. Also killer are the solos, which are generally in the blazing metal tradition of the 80's, thus bringing more energy and flare to already solid songs that offer a good amount of tempo changes and riffing styles from energetic thrash and boppy harmonies to chunky midpaced power chords or even a few discordant runs that flirt with a bit more technicality in the form of odd arpeggiated runs or unusual time signatures and quick shifts in the arrangements (check out "State Unknown"). "What If" is the first track that really starts to get more involved and flashy with its layered guitar passages and intricate flurries of lead riffs or background details with the synths and such; and "Life Surrounds" is a fast paced scorcher with tons of tightly performed alternate picking and a few breathers supplied by quick staccato chords and synths (a style that continues in "Sufferstream" with some blasts and tremolo picking); while "Receive, Retrieve & Escalate" lets singing vocals play a slightly larger role while the backing keyboards are a bit more prominently atmospheric - it's not one of my favorite songs as a whole, but it still has some cool ideas at work - the thick discordant chord phrasings, for example, are fucking amazing. It's "Complete" that's my favorite, though. The vocal performance feels more gripping, the riffs all piece together and layer perfectly, the transitions are fluid and powerful... it's just a great song start to finish. Also superb is the recording, which is heavy and fairly clear. The keyboards do tend to get lost in the shuffle, but honestly, who really cares about keyboards anyway? The vocals are nice and crisp, resting barely out in front of the music, and despite some underlying rigidity the percussion sounds pretty good. The bass tone basically serves to thicken up the core and fill the gaps, while the guitars are perfectly crunchy for the rhythms and sleek for the solos and pronounced guitar harmonies. I don't have any significant complaints at all. A lot of the imagery in the layout is pretty odd (along with the album title), but it does look professional and I tend to be a sucked for lots of layered textures and stuff like that. I'm not taken by most of the lyrics as things are rather abstract and hard to make sense of, with some of the clearer lines seeming to deal with a range of inner turmoil and such. This one's all about quality songwriting, though. Good riffs and cohesive, consistent structures make for solid songs and an effective full-length. It's not at all original, as stated, so without pushing for more creativity you'd never single out Cipher System from their contemporaries... but that doesn't matter in my opinion, because there aren't many bands of this nature that are performing at this level anymore, even in Sweden. Fans of the style should absolutely check this out, and I'll be looking forward to seeing how they progress in the future. Good stuff. (7/10)
Running time - 45:25, Tracks: 11
[Notable tracks: What If, Life Surrounds, Complete]
Lifeforce Records - http://www.lifeforcerecords.com

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