Outshine
The Awakening

It is an awakening when Outshine comes with a new album, it is their first one in almost a decade. I read in the press material about setbacks, duels with tax authorities and things like that. I also read about a darker album, inspired by darker times – and who can argue with that perception? Wars, conflicts, the ever neglected environmental and climate crisis, and many other things. And The Awakening also looks appropriately dark, a very attractive cover that will most certainly look great as a vinyl.

It is gothic and dark in terms of style, the vocals are of the preaching kind of style, like a priest on mass or something like that. Stating that it is all lies and things like that. The sound is strong, dark, and modern, a strong production. It lacks a bit in variation, my review copy contains two radio edits that ends the album, that certainly adds repetition and makes the playing time really long. The vinyl is probably 41 minutes long and without the edits, that is still long as this album tends to feel a bit repetitive fast. It lacks a little variation, and it doesn’t really move anywhere new – and that can make the long wait between albums seem a bit strange considering that they didn’t spend it trying to write more creatively exciting songs.

The Awakening has its highlights, some songs are quite strong, but as a whole it doesn’t really take off to the skies. I find the gloomy sound to be appealing, but it needs a bit of hope or light, hope and despair kind of go together and strengthen the dynamic feel if used well. In this case it is just doom and gloom and no fun, no hope, just an album where you eventually just want them to stop complaining, everything isn’t awful even when the world is burning there are positive things happening. So, I don’t need to buy this attractive vinyl as it doesn’t quite take off to those higher reaches, it doesn’t stand out from the rest – it is good enough to give a spin but not something to remember.

I think they are lacking in courage, and they make a too long album – it could still be worth checking out though. And that is especially if you are a fan of the gothic style metal, those that have liked Outshine’s earlier works will most likely find this one appealing as well. The Awakening is a decent album, but nowhere near as interesting as it can appear at first glance.

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