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Reviewed
by: Darklight
Glass
Eden is the solo project of Peter Blackwell. There is no way that you
would ever think by listening to the songs found on this album that
they were all perfromed by one person. Everything sounds like a group
effort. These songs sound like they were performed by a band and not
just a solo artist. There is so much variety delivered here that you
would think that this is a compilation album with various artists contributing
to it as opposed to the same guy doing it all. Track one "Give
Up" is pure heavy and aggressive guitar thrashing madness with
pissed off distorted screaming male vocals. It's a little repetitive
and has a slight NIN sound to it, but it still rocks. Track two "Sheep"
begins like some happy 70's retro song and then turns heavy and psycho
kind of like a Marilyn Manson song. It blends this uplifting feel in
and out mixed with the chaotic madness to make for quite an original
sound. Track three "Enough" has a bit more of a funk sound
to it and sounds similar to Sister Machine Gun with an electro rock
vibe to it. Track four "Human" is noisy, scratchy and distorted
with a NIN sound to it. Track five "Hymn 13" is a melodic
and beautiful song with soothing keyboard melodies and high pitched
clean singing. It doesn't fit on this album at all. Track six "Power"
is a heavy funk rock song with no industrial influences. It's another
song that sounds out of place on the album. Track seven "Real"
is another guitar heavy rock song with no industrial influences. It's
good, but doesn't quite fit too well here. Track eight "Goodbye"
is an acoustic alternative balad with no industrial touches making it
just not seem like it belongs here. Track nine "Underneath"
is a melodic and soothing piano/synth instrumental. Track ten "Headless"
is a great industrial rock song with demented female singing and an
overall twisted vibe to it. Track eleven "Anal" is a straight
forward aggressive guitar thrashing punk song with female screaming
vocals. Track twelve "Do It To Yourself" is an industrial
rock song with classic sounding guitar solos and a combination of both
male and female singing. It's a good heavy rock song. People might think
having so much variety on one album is a good thing. However, most of
these songs sound so much different from each other that you have to
switch from one mood to the next much too often making this album sound
all over the place. It's very difficult to enjoy this album from start
to finish without wanting to skip past a lot of the songs because they
sound so out of place here. There are a lot of great songs that go together,
but there are a few that don't quite work. Also, while there a lot of
different musical styles here, none of the songs sound that original.
There are a lot of NIN influences as well as Marilyn Manson and Sister
Machine Gun just to name a few. The music for the most part does have
a commercial sound to it, but just doesn't seem to be quite as polished
as most mainstream bands out there. So it fits somewhere between indie
rock and mainstream acceptance. I am sure once Peter perfects his sound
a little more Glass Eden will have a video on MTV and a song on the
radio before we know it. If you are a fan of a more electro rock style
of industrial music you will most likely enjoy what this album has to
offer. But if EBM and electro industrial are more your thing, you might
want to pass on this one. This is for fans of guitar heavy rock music
only.
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