LEPROUS Aphelion | Weekly Heavy Metal Album Review

Released by InsideOutMusic on August 27th, 2021

Quick Background

Leprous is a progressive metal (early) / rock (later) band from Norway, formed in 2001 with the first album released in 2009. The group was founded by singer and keyboardist Einar Solberg and guitarist Tor Oddmund Suhrke. Both are the remaining founding members left and they are the main songwriters. Since 2015's The Congregation Solberg is gradually dominating the writing process. Their acclaimed 2011 album Bilateral brought a lot of attention to them. After two albums which followed the same musical direction, Coal (2013) and The Congregation (2015), Leprous took a more rock-oriented and less metal approach with Malina (2017), their first record not to feature harsh vocals. 2019's Pitfalls continued with the prog rock direction and a lot of experimentations. I personally didn't really like that album and direction. So let's see what Aphelion brings.

Aphelion

Leprous' seventh studio album is a consequence of the pandemic as the band was not planning for a follow-up to Pitfalls so soon. According to Solberg "The aphelion is the point in the orbit of an object where it is farthest from the sun, and it has a symbolic value which I will leave to your own interpretation." Aphelion features ten tracks and clocks in at 56 minutes.  It's an intuitive and spontaneous album in which the band again did a lot of experimentation. With that said, differently than Pitfalls they brought back a bit more of the early sound albeit not going into super heavy territory. It's again mostly written by Solberg with some exceptions. 

The album was first hinted by the single "Castaway Angels" in December 2020, an acoustic ballad with a build up emphasizing the keys and drums. An emotional rock song. Six months later, the band announced the album began releasing a string of promotional singles prior to the album's release: "Running Low" the album opener was released with a video in June. This a dark and interesting song. Featuring some peaks and valleys of aggression and emotion. Musically it also includes cello, violin and brass orchestra arrangements. And that pretty much summarizes the album. Most of the songs have cool energetic moments and even some guitar parts of interest. But mostly they are very slow and soft, almost like a lullaby. For example, "Out of Here" despite a very soft and mellow song for the most part, when it explodes with the drums it becomes one of the coolest and heaviest moments on the album. Other songs mostly go to peaks and valleys within it.  "The Silent Revelation", also released as single, again the same, but the soft parts are so boring. but at least we do hear some nice guitarwork. Same for "The Shadow Side" which features the only guitar solo on the album. It's a nice one though. So it leaves with the feeling, why so few guitar moments? Finally, "Nighttime Disguise" which was a also a video single, closes the album. It's the only song fully credited as a collective effort. The best thing of this song is that the explosions of aggressiveness are worth the wait. There's even harsh screams! That is a song that fully works for me. And leaves me with a bad taste from the album but hope for the future.

The Picky Guy

Unfortunately I have a lot to be picky here. But overall this super soft mellow direction doesn't hold my attention and interest. "Have You Ever?" being a painful example but all over the album, the soft parts are a snooze fest. Sometimes beautiful, yes I admit, but often boring and close to put me to sleep. Very few guitar highlights for a band with two guitar players. In addition to the keys, the strings and brass orchestra dominate the album. 

Wrap Up Opinion 

Leprous became Solberg's band and this direction mostly doesn't work for me. It is however a better album than the previous one as at least we have some bursts of heaviness and strong emotions. And even a short harsh vocals at the end. Didn't that sound good? Maybe there's hope. They are obviously a very capable band and the good moments here leaves me with hope that a future release will appeal to me more. But for now Aphelion to me is a mixed bag, so I am giving it 76/100. If you liked the last album, this will work as well, but if you didn't, Aphelion while bringing the sound a bit closer to the older stuff, it doesn't do so by much.  

SCORE: 76/100

Genre: Progressive Rock

Released by InsideOutMusic on August 27th, 2021

Rating System

99 - 100 Perfect
94 - 98 Excellent
87 - 93 Great
82 - 86 Very Good
77 - 81 Good
66 - 76 Mixed
58 - 65 Bad

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