EVERGREY – A Decade And A Half [2 CD] (2011-12)

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Swedish melodic prog-metallers EVERGREY released in North America at the end of the last year a two-disc greatest hits collection; “A Decade And A Half”. This deluxe package contains previously unreleased songs, live tracks and an extensive booklet.
Rarely a ‘Best Of’ is really the most representative of the band’s best works. With Evergrey’s focus on lyrical themes throughout some of its records, a ‘Best Of’ might seem counter-intuitive to some listeners.
Thankfully, this compilation patches together a complete picture of the band over its 15-year existence.

Separating themselves from other metal oriented acts, the focus on purely clean singing and painfully realistic / emotional lyrics have become the group’s trademark.
The mates of Sweden’s Evergrey have cemented a reputation as some of Gothenburg’s finest musicians throughout the years with their melodic progressive metal.

“A Decade and a Half” gives listeners more than enough material to get a good picture of Evergrey if they’ve never heard of the band before.
Jumping off from the band’s third album, “The Masterplan” begins the first disc and runs on into a track from the first record, “Blackened Dawn”. Lead guitarist/vocalist Tom Englund’s lyrics take on an especially Lovecraftian feel in some songs, often taking on fatalistic stances and getting at the heart of victimization, fear, guilt, outrage and paranoia.
In “Rulers of the Mind,” the band confronts conspiracy and helplessness through an expertly played and highly melodic piano and riff-driven approach. “A Touch of Blessing” feels oddly-placed, and will feel oddly placed to listeners that are already familiar with the band’s discography. It feels like an opener in the middle of an album with its slow intro, which is exactly what it is.
It doesn’t looks like any pre-meditation was put into the ordering of the tracks.
Included are songs from the live album/DVD ‘A Night To Remember’, as well as a couple of unreleased unplugged versions of songs from ‘Glorious Collision’.
“The Great Deceiver” and “Monday Morning Apocalypse” kick off CD 2, which tends to focus a little more on the latter half of the Evergrey discography, but still remains fairly representative.

First-time listeners will get to hear here a logical blend of the various incarnations of Evergrey from its most exploratory to its most concise, back to back material.
Fans will be happy with the 2 previously unreleased tracks plus that all the major songs of the band are on two discs instead of interspersed throughout nine albums.
Evergrey is a more than interesting band, often overlooked by rockers not much into this genre, so “A Decade and a Half” is as good a place as any to investigate them for the first time.
Good, powerful and intense stuff.

You’ve seen it first here, at zerodayrock

CD 1 :
01. The Masterplan
02. Blackened Dawn (live)
03. Rulers Of The Mind
04. A Touch Of Blessing
05. Frozen
06. For Every Tear That Falls (live)
07. More Than Ever
08. Blinded
09. Faith Restored
10. These Scars
11. Broken Wings
12. Words Mean Nothing
13. Wrong (live) (unplugged; previously unreleased)

CD 2 :
01. The Great Deceiver
02. Monday Morning Apocalypse
03. Wrong
04. Waking Up Blind (live)
05. Solitude Within
06. Recreation Day
07. Still In The Water
08. Leave It Behind Us
09. Fear
10. When The Walls Go Down (live)
11. Frozen (live) (unplugged; previously unreleased)

Tom Englund – Vocals, Guitar
Rikard Zander- Keyboards
Marcus Jidell – Guitar
Johan Niemann- Bass
Hannes Van Dahl – Drums

BUY IT !
www.amazon.com/Decade-Half-Evergrey/dp/B005BY91Z0