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Symphonic Delain

Mr. Gregory

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Mar 28, 2018
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New Jersey
#1
delain_2016.jpg


Official Website

Current members :
Note: Ruben Israel (drums), pictured at the far right, left Delain sometime last year. They've been touring with Joey de Boer from Purest of Pain.

Albums:

Delain is a Dutch symphonic metal band. Martijn Westerholt and Charlotte Wessels started it up back in 2002 after Martijn left Within Temptation. They're actually one of the first metal bands I ever listened to, but it took me a while to really get into them. I bought Lucidity first, and while I couldn't really get into it overall, I liked the songs "Sever" and "Frozen" and thought that they had potential. I took a chance on April Rain, and despite the somewhat poppy love/relationship lyrics, it wasn't bad at all. I loved Charlotte's voice, and the instrumentation was pretty solid. They've gotten better with every subsequent album and are now one of my favorite symphonic metal bands.

As for their particular style, Martijn and Charlotte generally tend to set the melody with the keyboard and vocals while the guitars chug along behind them and handle the harmony. Their sound is perhaps a bit more simplistic than that of, say, Xandria or Epica, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. Their songs are catchy and have plenty of hooks in them, but not to the point of tediousness. Lyrically, as I previously mentioned, they started out with basic poppy stuff about love and relationships and whatnot, and they still talk about that in their songs, but they've evolved and have gotten a little deeper and more philosophical overall. For example, the song "Your Body is a Battleground" from The Human Contradiction is an attack on the pharmaceutical industry and talks about how we're all overly dependent on medicine. Marco Hietala from Nightwish was a guest vocalist on this one.


The Human Contradiction was a great album and is my recommended starting point for anyone who hasn't heard Delain before. "Stardust" was the first single that I heard from it, and it really changed the game for me as far as they were concerned. It elevated them from a band I kind of liked to a band I loved.


Moonbathers is my favorite album of theirs. Here are two of my favorite songs from it, "Suckerpunch" and "Turn the Lights Out." Lyrically, "Turn the Lights Out" sounds almost like something Nightwish would have put on their Endless Forms Most Beautiful album. It's so good.


 
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Magic

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#2
I am a fan!!!

I like all their albums but I have a soft spot for Lucidity because....It is the only album that I know of that you can hear a duet between Sharon Den Adel and Marco Hietala

No Compliance
 

Mr. Gregory

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#4
I am a fan!!!

I like all their albums but I have a soft spot for Lucidity because....It is the only album that I know of that you can hear a duet between Sharon Den Adel and Marco Hietala

No Compliance
Wow, that song's not bad at all. I'm sure I could appreciate Lucidity much more if I went back and listened to it now.

Here's one of my favorites from April Rain. The intro hits so hard. Deeyum, son! :cool:


This thread was long overdue. Took me an hour and a half!
 

Mr. Gregory

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#5

Magic

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#8
I find if I shut out any remarks I have read (or heard) and give an album a fair listen, I usually can get a better opinion. I always try to listen from my headphones before I decide whether I like something or not.

I'm pretty open minded when it comes to music. I'm not one of those elitists ;)
 

Mr. Gregory

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#9
I find if I shut out any remarks I have read (or heard) and give an album a fair listen, I usually can get a better opinion. I always try to listen from my headphones before I decide whether I like something or not.

I'm pretty open minded when it comes to music. I'm not one of those elitists ;)
Same here. I look at reviews and album ratings sometimes, when I'm curious to see other people's opinions on something, but they never make or break my opinion of an album. When I first got into metal, and particularly when I was into black metal, I was a bit of a snob about it, but not anymore. There's a reason there are so many genres and subgenres of music - there's something for everybody.

These days, I'll give almost anything a chance. I've found some great stuff that way, just winging it and giving something random a listen.
 

Mr. Gregory

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Messages
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#10
Delain just released a new single, Masters of Destiny, from their upcoming EP Hunter's Moon, which is coming out on February 22nd. I swear, this band has been on a steady upward trajectory since their formation, and I've enjoyed watching them progress and get better and better.

 

Magic

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#11
@Mr. Gregory

That song is stupendous! Delain has definitely refined their music.

I usually don't invest in EP's. I'm curious what (or when) they will put out another full length album.
 

Mr. Gregory

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#12
@Mr. Gregory

That song is stupendous! Delain has definitely refined their music.

I usually don't invest in EP's. I'm curious what (or when) they will put out another full length album.
*gasp* A wild Magic appeared!

shockedpikachu.png


Yeah, I prefer full albums too, and I was disappointed to learn that Hunter's Moon is just an EP. That being said, I'm not opposed to EPs, depending on the content and how much I like that particular band. If I recall correctly, there are at least two or three new tracks on this one, so at a minimum, I'll listen to it on Spotify. I always like hearing new material from my favorite bands.
 

Mr. Gregory

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#14
@Mr. Gregory I don't know anything about Spotify. Clue me in?
It's a popular streaming music service, like Google Play, Amazon Music, etc. It's kind of like the Netflix of music. You can listen to as much as you want in their massive, massive music library at any time, and you can create your own personal library/playlists.

There's a free plan which gives you ads after every few tracks you listen to (yuck), and a paid plan that's like $9.99 per month which has no ads and allows you to download something like 3,333 songs to listen to offline (via the app). I'm on a free one month trial of the paid plan, and it's pretty sweet. I'm probably going to keep using it, because it integrates seamlessly with my PS4.

Artists get paid some super small amount of money every time you listen to their songs/albums and add their material to your Spotify library.

If you listen to a lot of music, like I do, it's totally worth it. You should check it out!
 

Riff_Raff

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#18

Mr. Gregory

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#20
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