CD Info

2010
Storm Blaze Records 

7  Tracks

English Lyrics

Dark melodic death metal, from Colombia. Coming largely from Miami as I am, with its largely Spanish population, it’s a little unnerving to hear this type of music from that kind of culture. I’m a little more familiar with Salsa. But Inheritor does the dark brand of Gothic about as well as anyone, and, if you want to really get a feel for it, check this video from the CD under review here. It’s Gothic, straight from a massive Colombian cemetery, the Central Cemetery in downtown Bogota. The music features a dark, lovely Colombian seniority and some outstanding South American guitar playing, from the dark side of Bogota. The cover of the CD continues with that theme, just to let you know what you’re in for. Our lovely seniority is Victoria Mejia, and doesn’t she remind me of the talent appearing regularly for your viewing pleasure nightly in the clubs on South Beach. I just didn’t find any Colombians on South Beach singing this kind of music. Sultry, with burning dark eyes and a voice to match, Mejia brings the Beauty to the B & B, South American style. The dark male vocals are compliments of Alejandro Cardenas, who also plays guitarra, along with Alexander Gerena and several guest musicians, and that guitar work is superb.

There are a lot of styles present in the music. The vocals, the female vocals anyway, resulted from an experiment of sorts. The band wanted a melodic sound and took on Vicky as an experiment. Clearly, the sound worked and she is now a significant part of the band’s makeup, but that sound comes from some unexpected places. Vicky, it is reported, is a 60s and 70s rock fan, and a big Janis Joplin fan at that. You get a little of that direction here on occasion, the bluesy sound Joplin made famous. And, given the darkness of Joplin’s life, it fits rather nicely into the overall Inheritor motif. The guitars take several roads to arrive here and reflect some unexpected perspective. There’s the "heavy metal" sound from bands like Iron Maiden, Motorhead and Judas Priest. There’s the Gothenburg sound from bands like At the Gates, In Flames and Dark Tranquility. And finally, the band links their heavy axe work to older bands, names like Zeppelin, Pink Floyd and Deep Purple. However, the acoustic sound, in addition to the obvious South American influence, can be traced to bands like Dissection in songs like Knight’s Blood or albums like "The Jester Race" from In Flames. However, the music demonstrates a certain academic orientation as a result of the band’s academic background; all but one hold Bachelors degrees with three of them being in sound engineering. . . and the other is working on it.

The music is a melodic form of B & B, with that South American guitar thrown in to remind you where they’re from. But, it’s great Gothic, solid metal and just a little bit different from what you get with the Europeans. You don’t get the keys, the symphonic, you don’t get an opera vocal, but the death metal growling is strong and the themes addressed lyrically in the music are entertaining and worth paying attention to. The music comes from various directions; neoclassical, symphonic, progressive and the South American influence that flows largely through the acoustic guitars and provides that singular sound that comes from nowhere else. And the female vocal magnifies that part of the Inheritor approach. You hear this type of vocal in a lot of the Hispanic music, just not in this type of music, in this type of sound. But it defines what Inheritor is all about and provides a framework from which the music flows.

The work begins with Path of Oblivion, with a whispered vocal over a Gothic bell. No pure classical perspective here, no symphonic intro to introduce a Dutch Gothic. We get right to the guitars and they crunch. But the music moves in multiple directions, there are timing switches, from hard to haunting and back again. The guitars, and there are a few of them working at all times, drive the music as Vicky and Alejandro trade vocals. And those vocals take a decidedly Gothic direction right from the beginning:

The song is metal, relatively hard metal. However, the female vocals, even as the guitars pound out a thundering bottom line, remain relatively melodic. No screaming Janis Joplin here.

Beloved Forsaken continues this metal direction with a wicked guitar duet as an intro. Inheritor is guitar action first and foremost and this song continues that direction. Again, the female vocals flow over the guitars and are largely subdued, certainly in comparison to the male component. We get a more pronounced drum on this selection but it’s definitely the guitars that carry the day with some fine picking.

We see a different direction in Tenderness Thru Ferocity. Although there is another hard guitar driven intro, the song settles down into something approaching a ballad after the first couple bars. The guitars tone it down some and we get the more haunting Vicky vocal. Again, there’s something approaching a dialog between the vocalists and Vicky provides some of the strongest vocals of the CD, again over some outstanding guitar work.

As Brief as Beauty takes us to the beauty, with a lovely Spanish acoustical guitar that takes us to a lovely vocal by our Colombian chanteuse. It’s actually overlaid a bit which makes it even more entertaining. This is a sound that only comes from the Southern continent, lovely and entertaining. But the beauty strays towards the end, as the guitar players remind us this is metal, with a scorching sound off that leads to the following track, The Tarot and the Rose. Here we return to the hard metal, with the harsh male vocals over the thrashing guitars. Again, we hear some overlaid female vocals that give the Inheritor music that different direction. The lyrics again flow from a perspective Alejandro describes as "its like the album title, its just ‘pure passion’ when it comes to life: you know rage, hate, love, the struggle and the every day battle to remain." On this selection we hear:

Inheritor provides a different interpretation of the Female fronted, or Gothic, direction. The vocals are lovely, but with a decidedly different approach to the music. The guitar work has both a traditional component and one that reflects the culture from which it originates. And it’s this subtle difference that makes the music interesting. Good effort Inheritor, bring on some more. Nosotros queremos más.

9 / 10

• Prev
• Next