EVERGREY A Heartless Portrait (The Orphean Testament) | Weekly Heavy Metal Album Review

Released by Napalm Recordson May 20th, 2022 

Quick Background

The Swedish heavy metal band Evergrey is celebrating over 25 years of metal mastery. The band is led by founder, singer and guitarist Tom S. Englund. While he is the only founder member left, the 5-piece line up has been stable since 2014 having released 4 albums before this one with the current formation. Evergrey can mostly be considered a progressive (power) metal band, but they are far from happy metal, actually the band's lyrics have always been of the darker sort, and the same can be said of the band's imagery. While I am a big fan of their sound and I own many of their records, to me they are a bit of a "best of" band, I love many songs, but I don't love any album in particular.  

A Heartless Portrait (The Orphean Testament)

A Heartless Portrait (The Orphean Testament) is their thirteenth studio album and Napalm Records debut and it is the follow-up to the highly successful 2021 full-length, Escape of the Phoenix. Which I personally did not care so much for it. Despite having one of my favorite songs of 2021: "Eternal Nocturnal". The new effort features 10 songs and clocks in at 51 minutes. It's a more concise record than the previous, one so to me a good start. 

The album opens with "Save Us" displaying a strong and heavy guitar work backed up by some subtle keys. During the bridges 'Hey! Save us!' the fans joined them as the band recorded hundreds of voices that ended up on the final result. The chorus is emotional and catchy as we come to expect from Evergrey. This was the first video single out of the album. "Midwinter Calls" was the second and it features some more heavy riffs and it is overall another strong song with again very nice melodies, specially during the verses. I don't love the 'Oh Oh' parts, but ok. Also I must point out the higher level of the guitar solos on this album. Both Tom Englund and Henrik Danhage seemed to have stepped up their game and that led to more trading solos than ever before. "Blindfolded" is the third and last video of their trilogy. It's also really the first episode of this three-piece story. It's another heavy and strong track. It's quite cool that such a strong song is placed that late on the album, it speaks to the quality of A Heartless Portrait". 

Those songs are heavy but there's also another side of the band and with "Ominous" Evergrey goes melancholic and darker and progressive. A beautiful song. Here it's another example of the cool guitar solos I talked about. "The Great Unwashed" and specially "Wildfires" are both more on this side as well. "Call Out The Dark" brings the keys to the forefront with a cool riff. And it deliver one of the best chorus on this album. Very catchy and groovy song, no wonder it's one of their singles. 

The heavy riffage is back with the sort of title track "The Orphean Testament", the longest song on the album with 6:30 minutes. The other kind of title track is "Heartless". An up-tempo heavy song with another catchy chorus. A highlight in this song tome is the bridge after the second chorus, it's a variation of the chorus but more atmospheric and it demo how much of a great singer Tom Englund is. It's a beautiful passage. And actually all over the album his performance is excellent, it's great to see that he keeps improving and expanding his techniques. 

The Picky Guy

I enjoyed this album quite a lot and I don't have specific issues with it, but if I were to pick on something, maybe "Wildfires" was an unnecessary closer and I'd be fine without it.

Wrap Up Opinion 

Less than a year after the previous record Evergrey delivered one of their strongest albums in years, it can even become my favorite. The album flows greatly and I could sense I'd be hooked on it after the first listen. And since them it only grew on me. An overwhelming journey through progressive heaviness and searing emotionality is repeatedly accented by sonic melancholy and gripping lyrics. There's a lot of heaviness in this album but masterly combined with melancholy and slower moments. Besides it's very catchy and musically featuring strong riff and solos. Very good album, 83/100. A progressive metal lesson without overdoing it.

SCORE: 83/100

Genre: Progressive Metal

Released by Napalm Recordson May 20th, 2022 

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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