One of the greatest things of this job – and there are a lot of them – is to be able to follow the album after album evolution of the bands. Bands do change a lot, I must say. It does not matter the path they take, but some bands change completely. That is what happened to Them, a band that started inspired by Mercyful Fate and King Diamond solo era features, and now are a Speed Metal hell with many outstanding features as the prone to write concept albums as this “Psychedelic Enigma” is.
As a concept album, “Psychedelic Enigma” follows the steps of other horror inspired albums. But the terror here is more subtle having to do more with mind games than the visceral thing. Well, mental institutions are a fountain of inspiration for Metal bands from all styles. Them wrapped them all with a wrap of Speed Metal and Power Metal. Sometimes from the album comes a slight remembrance of Iced Earth mostly from the vocals in moments as in “Electric Church” where the band also homages King Diamond. Listening to the entire album, the fan will have the feeling of it being a whole thing as each track is connected to each other perfectly. Them explore pretty well the boundaries and the misteries of the mind here in tracks as obvious as “Catatonia“ or “Troubled Minds” or not that obvious as “Echoes Of The Forgotten Realm,” a track that delivers touching melodic vocals with pristine guitar melodic work with a cinematic ending. By the way, cinematic is a word that serves the album right.
Them are the kind of band that evolves in each album. “Psychedelic Enigma” proves that now the band is able to put into great quality music all the twisted things that come to mind. Maybe, just maybe, “Psychedelic Enigma” comes from a sequence of nightmares or bad experiences the band experimented through life. “Troubled Minds” is a great example of it.
Them “Psychedelic Enigma” will be released on October 24th via Steamhammer.
Track Listing:
01 Ad Rem
02 Catatonia
03 An Evil Deed
04 Reverie
05 Remember To Die
06 Silent Room
07 Psychonautic State
08 The Scarlett Remains
09 Electric Church
10 Echoes Of The Forgotten Realm
11 Troubled Minds
12 Delirium
Watch “Catatonia” official music video here:
I’m just a lucky guy who has chosen metal to live with for a long time. Metal changed my life for good. It made me more confident and stronger. Metalheads are naturally far away from the mass mediocrity and don’t accept impostures from anybody else. Metal is more than music, it’s a life changing oportunity!