Like many others, I was hugely disappointed when Johan Liiva left (?) Arch Enemy. I hadn’t been a fan for long, but those first three albums left a strong impression on me during my second age of discovery. How could they replace such a voice, and who would be the man to do it?
That man turned out to be Angela Gossow, who was decidedly NOT a man. Small in stature but huge in presence, she was immediately thrust into the spotlight within a scene that hadn’t seen a whole lot of female vocalists. She quickly proved she could hold her own on their 2001 breakout album Wages of Sin, which also found the band doubling-down on the more melodic approach taken on Burning Bridges. It was a calculated move by the band to take things to the next level, and a successful one at that. Their popularity skyrocketed and they became a hot commodity on the touring circuit.
That hot streak continued with 2003’s follow-up Anthems of Rebellion. Soon, the scene was flooded with female-fronted bands across all sub-genres. As the novelty wore off, the band began to stagnate. Doomsday Machine and Rise of the Tyrant were average albums at best. They attempted to reinvigorate things by re-recording material from the first three albums, but The Root of All Evil proved to be a huge misstep. Khaos Legions looked to be a step in the right direction, but less than a year after its release, guitarist Christopher Amott departed once again. With a return seeming unlikely this time, fans were forced to wonder how the band would carry on without one of their core members. About two years later, Gossow announced that she had stepped down as vocalist, but would continue to manage the band.
Now, this is a big moment. The decision was surely made long before she went public with it. Was it burnout? Was it a creative decision? Most importantly, would Arch Enemy do as so many others had done before, and use this moment to reinvent themselves (once again) following a stretch dominated by mediocrity? Imagine the possibilities a fresh face and a new voice would hold for a group of musicians as talented and respected as Michael Amott, Daniel Erlandsson, and Sharlee D’Angelo (rounded out by newest member Nick Cordle). Or, mercy, would they go the Black Sabbath/Iron Maiden/Judas Priest/Anthrax route and welcome back their original vocalist (don’t nitpick me with Dianno/Atkins/Turbin)? Holy shit, Arch Enemy could be primed for a whole new era of excellence! WHO COULD IT BE?!
Enter Alissa White-Gluz, now formerly of The Agonist. Okay…interesting. I had heard a couple of their albums, enough to be familiar, but not overly impressed, with their work. Her ability to pull off both clean and growl vocals could lead to a further exploration of melodics within Arch Enemy. Whether this would be a good or a bad thing was unclear, but I wouldn’t have to wait long to find out. The announcement was accompanied by news of a new album and the unveiling of a video for the title track. Even as I clicked to play, I couldn’t shake a feeling of impending disappointment.
And there it was. For all intents and purposes, an exact soundalike. That was a bit anticlimactic. Well, I thought, it is the lead single. Maybe they’re just easing those afraid of change gently into the new era.
But then came “You Will Know My Name,” which had a bit more of a commercial sheen. This would have been a great one to experiment with some of those clean vocals on…yet, still no sign of those anywhere.
So War Eternal finally drops, and the truth soon becomes apparent: my initial impression was correct. White-Gluz is essentially being presented as a younger Gossow in an edgier-looking package. In all likelihood, they could have waited until after the album was released to make the announcement and no one would have noticed the difference. Adherents to traditional logic might argue that this is a good thing, but for a band badly in need of a shake-up, that argument is invalid.
Now, all of this isn’t really fair to White-Gluz. Much of the material was likely already written before she was even brought on board, and we can’t really expect her to turn down the job. It may not even be fair to the band, or at least the aforementioned material. Musically this could be their strongest work since Wages of Sin. The new members do seem to have caused a rediscovery of some of that early fire, as evidenced by the one-two punch of “War Eternal” and “As the Pages Burn.” And creative juices were certainly flowing when they decided to incorporate orchestral elements into tracks like “Time Is Black” and “Avalanche.”
But there are still some clunkers, like the flat “Down to Nothing” and the aforementioned blandness of “You Will Know My Name.” They play a little mind game with you at the end with the instrumental dirge “Not Long For This World,” making it seem like it may break into a hellfire song at any moment. It never does, but it makes you want to hear more – instant replay value.
(Note: If you get the special edition, you will finally get a hint of clean vocals on the bonus cover of Mike Oldfield’s “Shadow On The Wall.” They work well, but that may be more due to the nature of the song than anything else.)
But I keep going back to the choice of vocalist and that unspectacular first impression. While I know it shouldn’t, it is severely affecting my view of the album. They made a choice to stay the course with both their overall sound and their image so as not to upset or offend the fanbase they had worked so hard to build. Unfortunately, for someone like me, this album is offensive in its inoffensiveness.
