Delain – We Are The Others (2012)

After being shelved for several months by Delain’s European label, “We Are The Others” finally sees the light of day in North America on July 3rd, through Sensory Records. Featuring four bonus live tracks, this North American version is packed with enough material to keep the fans of the band pleased for a long time.

Three years have passed since the highly popular “April Rain”, and with “We Are The Others” the band is looking to establish themselves as one of the premiere Gothic Metal bands in the world. Following the same musical direction, Delain delivers 12 tracks of well composed Gothic Metal with heavy Rock influences. The band does a few adjustments in terms of making their music catchier, but nothing much has changed.

Opening with “Mother Machine”, the band nicely establishes an upbeat vibe. Charlotte’s vocals are the central point of things and she does a great job in delivering every note perfectly with her sweet voice. The first ‘single’ we can hear from this release is the uber catchy “We Are The Others”, the combination of elaborate keyboard sections, melodic vocals and harsh guitars is a staple of the genre. The band’s signature sound is present in all the tracks in this release, making it highly appealing for fans of the band’s previous releases.

Emotional tracks like “Hit Me With Your Best Shot”, “I Want You”, and “Are you Done With Me” keep things mellow and very diverse. Other songs like “Where is the Blood” (featuring Fear Factory’s Burton Bell) sound a bit Evanescence-ish, marking a bit of a departure of their main sound (but only in this track). Super catchy anthems like “Generation Me” and “Babylon”, keep things fresh and appealing, even for the average listener. Our personal favorite is the epic “Not Enough” and it’s powerful guitar work.

Sensory Records edition of this release also features four extra live tracks: “The Gathering” (with Marco Hietala (our personal favorite song of the band), “Control The Storm” (again with Marco), “Shattered” and “Sleepwalkers Dream”. All of these tracks have a great recording quality and give you that live feeling that should be achieved with any live track, but that rarely happens.

Overall, we quite enjoyed “We Are The Others”. We think that Delain is doing a great job in carving their own little niche in the genre and release by release they keep consolidating their sound. However, there is also a bit of a lack of innovation and pushing forward from the band, while the songs are good, they all sound very similar to their previous releases, just like a continuation and not a progression. We might be extremely picky about this, but we are sure that fans of the band (us included) will love this release for the catchy and well-crafted music it features.

Release: July 3rd, 2012

Country: Netherlands