Tristania - World of Glass

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Free Music Notes for World of Glass

Free Music Review: World of Glass weaves opera and metal beautifully!
Hit: 5 Stars

The choir, with its Latin words, opens with a soaring power and vitality in the opening track, "The Shining Path," accompanied by Tristania's usual sound of fury. Vibeke's operatic voice then appears in its full beauty. The song's about a female witch or heretic who is burned at the stake, and the point of view is alternately omniscient, and from her. My second favorite track, and what an opener at that!

The millennial "Wormwood," equally potent, seems to be taken from the book of Revelation, about the end of the world, and the loss of faith proceeding from it.

Osten Bergoy is Vibeke Stene's male counterpart, and is billed as "clean male vocals." Both he and Vibeke sing on "Tender Trip On Earth," and sing together on the last verse. Love that refrain: "Tears falling from the sky/Words from a lullaby/Everything beautiful dies."

Tristania then takes an unexpected trip to techno in "Lost." There are some catchy guitar riffs in the chorus: "I'm one--I'm anyone you like me to be/I'm gone--Whenever you would like to be free."

The haunting ballad "Deadlocked" has Vibeke on lead vocals, accompanied by her choir on the chorus. My third favorite track.

One line in the depressing "Selling Out" describes my life to a tee: "The years that passed me by/The child in me just died/The scars in me will never heal/An overdose of nothingness," with the last line repeated a couple times. It is a softer track ringing of despair, and Vibeke sings of running out of dreams, words, tears, screams,... essentially, "I'm running out of life again."

"Hatred" is a wonderfully realized anti-war song, with Vibeke playing the goddess of war and destruction, with her choir as accompanying war sirens: "I'll give you strength to continue the fight/I'll feed you anger and soft little lies." One line in particular makes me angry: "My god is great/I've killed before/All is fair and love and war and peace." I've read of various heads of state and secret societies who think like that, and that is total bollocks! The ugly side of religion is people who kill in its name, believing their god is the greatest. I'm not referring to just militant hijackers, but Pope Urban and the warriors of the Crusades. Catholics, Protestants, Jews, Hindi, Muslims equal share the blame. And we are no different, as we use the phrase "God Bless America." I don't think we have a monopoly on the Christian god. The bottom line of war: "So much pain/so many tears/Out of blood hatred grows."
The title track may also have war connotations: "a falling stone in a world of glass." It's the final track, the 7:41 long "Crushed Dreams," that's my favorite. The choir sings "Exterminate.../Eradicate..." accompanied by frenzied strings.

There's a more consistent and refined sound on World Of Glass. Vibeke and the choir, the features I enjoyed upon first hearing them, play a larger and more vital role than on Beyond The Veil. I hope they keep this style.

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