7DAYS – The Weight Of The World

There are a few labels where you know roughly what you are going to get if you buy one of their releases: Lion Music, Inside Out, Point Music, Frontiers, and – Rivel Records. Named after its founder Christian Rivel, singer of the White Metal outfit Narnia (among others), it will come as no surprise that this is a Christian, Neo-classical, Melodic Metal release. This may seem tiresome to some, uninspired to others, but reliability is quite a virtue during times of more releases than one can listen to each month. Rivel Records maintains a high level of quality throughout their releases, and 7Days is no exception.

The first thing that catches your attention is the cover, and it would be hard to find one elsewhere these days that has been so nicely done: simple, yet with playful details, condensed to the minimum color-wise — transporting the title The Weight Of The World emotionally into an impression of burden, winter, psychic hardship, longing … some of the pages like the one for “The Darkest Winter,” or the page which shows guitarist Markus Sigfridsson, are just beautiful.

Already put into the right mood by the cover, 7Days’ emotional sound translates to a gripping piece of music. All the lyrics circle around the desperate search for guidance, for the light inside the dark. It will come as no surprise that the songs are all mostly set in mid- or slow- tempo, although pace changes are common and puts 7Days on the brink to Prog at times. Ever-present keyboards emancipated with their guitar counterparts make this album edge towards the lighter side of Hard Rock, nevertheless the general musicianship is audibly of high potency. It should be no surprise when one discovers that drummer Daniel Flores also plays for the Swedish Prog band Minds Eye, was involved in Tears Of Anger’s In The Shadows, Daniel Palmqvist’s solo album A Landscape Made From Dreams, and works with Swedish Prog comer Pedestrians Of Blue. But, the other musicians can live up to this status too, like Andreas Olsson who is member of Narnia, and Kaspar Dahlkvist who comes up with some very intense keyboard parts.

While the album contains no bad songs, a few highlights are worthy of specially mention. On “Fall Again,” Caroline Sigfridsson (wife of Markus, assumingly) as second singer besides a very melodic Thomas Vikström marks a nice change in composition. This song, with its slow, heavy pace, dips into the bombastic Metal known from Evanescence, Within Temptation, and Edenbridge, changing between beautiful chorus and passages where the whole band is building up suspense until you think they are going to burst any second … and then they just don’t. When the song is over, you are tempted to start it again. Not the least because of the great keyboard solo.

The opening track “Redeemer,” while an unsurprising, typical composition for this type of music, also deserves to be highlighted because it is such a well-balanced track, which could stand as a role model for all albums in this Metal niche to come. The title track “The Weight Of The World” stands out because it exhibits some very fine keyboards, which partly remind of German Prog legend Payne’s Gray, and great harmony vocals. Last, a cover version must be pointed out: “Wisdom Calls,” originally recorded by Veni Domine, sounds perfect and Dio-ish in this arrangement. Production, harmonies, and performance are nothing less than outstanding, so after this track, there is hardly any other choice than to go back to track one and start again.

Since the compositions, while excellent songs if judged one by one, are a bit similar to each other, the only criticism may be that some more variety would have made it a more interesting and exciting album. But, as said in the beginning, it delivers what it promises, and does that with brilliance. If you’re interested at all in this type of music, you should already be on your way to support this band and this label.