New Cyhra Album 2018-2019

[A88]

Let’s just be real. It works cuz of the girl.

Yeah, the girl... But they make good pop songs with a lot of power and energy. (Shampoo commercial Sabaton with tits)

It's a complete product for the market.

Catchy - check
Chugging - check
Cheesy solos - check
Girl power - check
Nice curves - check
5 seconds of angry screaming - check
Fancy videos - check

Cyhra just can't compete on that level.

 

[DE4life]

First two Amaranthe albums are great. Vocals are shared evenly across all the vocalists. Nexus has more melodeath on it than any IF album since Clayman.

After that though it became the Elise Ryd show with way more emphasis on electronics and basic pop, so other than a couple of tracks I don't listen to anything post-Nexus.

 

[galvanized]

The clips I listened to of Amaranthe were boring and sucked. Slightly more lively than Lacuna Coil. Somehow I missed the good stuff? Because my opinion is that Cyhra is even better than Amaranthe. Sounds like I’m misinformed.

 

[DE4life]

I put Amaranthe's self-titled debut on roughly the same level as Cyhra's first album. Some good songs, some so-so songs. It's okay.

The Nexus is legit one of my favourite albums though. I enjoy every song on it from beginning to end. I really dig the dystopian/mecha vibe going on throughout the album and think they did a great job telling that story.

My favourite song off it is probably Mechanical Illusion. It reminds me of a Scar Symmetry song with some extra female vocals. The production is nice and clear, riffs are really solid, the vocals all sound great, the lyrics are decent, the solo fits in perfectly and the electronics add to the song rather than take away from it.



The title track is my second favourite, for similar reasons to the above, although Elize is a lot more prevelant this time. The chorus is just ridiculously catchy to me. Very pop and very cheesy, but hey, as a big power metal fan why wouldn't I love that?



Can't really speak for anything after this album as I don't have much interest in Amaranthe after this point. First two albums definitely hit all the right spots for me personally though.

 

[eochaid]

I don't underdtand the hype for bands like this.

They add zero value to the genre. The music base is boring and mediocre. The vocal lines have nothing to do with metal and are nothing special. The onlybthing that comes tommind is that they would sell shit as a pop band so they decided to tkae chances into metal.

But I can't imagine any of its members being a hardcore metal fan in any time of their lives.

The worst part, is that this is becoming a trending in metal.

 

[DE4life]

I can understand comments like that about bands like Brokencyde, but it's way over the top for a band like Amaranthe who are actually really good at what they do even if it isn't to everybody's taste. To my knowledge they've never claimed to be a hardcore metal band, or hardcore metal fans for that matter, so it's not really a stick to beat them with.

 

[galvanized]

I put Amaranthe's self-titled debut on roughly the same level as Cyhra's first album. Some good songs, some so-so songs. It's okay.

The Nexus is legit one of my favourite albums though. I enjoy every song on it from beginning to end. I really dig the dystopian/mecha vibe going on throughout the album and think they did a great job telling that story.

My favourite song off it is probably Mechanical Illusion. It reminds me of a Scar Symmetry song with some extra female vocals. The production is nice and clear, riffs are really solid, the vocals all sound great, the lyrics are decent, the solo fits in perfectly and the electronics add to the song rather than take away from it.



The title track is my second favourite, for similar reasons to the above, although Elize is a lot more prevelant this time. The chorus is just ridiculously catchy to me. Very pop and very cheesy, but hey, as a big power metal fan why wouldn't I love that?



Can't really speak for anything after this album as I don't have much interest in Amaranthe after this point. First two albums definitely hit all the right spots for me personally though.

I get very heavy Soilwork Natural Born Chaos vibes from the first song. The vocalist and the riffs sound so familiar.

 

[DE4life]

I get very heavy Soilwork Natural Born Chaos vibes from the first song. The vocalist and the riffs sound so familiar.

Yeah no doubt. A lot of the riffing & harsh vocals are very reminiscent of Predator's Portrait/NBC era Soilwork. The electronics & overall theme of the song (and album in general) are also highly similar to Scar Symmetry during the Holographic Universe/Pitch Black Progress period. It's a bit of a mish-mash of all of that mid-2000s electronic-tinged melodeath.

Speaking of Scar Symmetry, they're another band I don't hear much about these days. I really liked them back in the day.



To me there isn't that much difference between what Scar Symmetry are doing here and what Amaranthe are doing throughout The Nexus, but because it's Amaranthe it's automatically labelled as shit even though the sounds are pretty damn similar.

 

[A88]

There are some similarities, especially with Mechanical Illusions... but saying it's the same thing is going too far bro.

I have the same problem with Amaranthe and Sabaton to some extent. It is as basic as it gets. Everything, from guitar and keyboard sound to songwriting. They are catchy, and I can enjoy both bands when I'm in the mood, but it just lacks real substance and quality. Maybe I'll sound a bit elitist (oh, look at me, I'm so tr00), but that is not what metal is supposed to be. It is pop music with distorted guitars in the background.

As much I can nod to The Lion from the North, or whistle along with To Hell and Back, or mumble Like a siiign, like a dreeeam, you're my amaranthineee... at the end of the day there is no real interest, challenge or emotional connection. And that is not good.

But OK, everything written above is very subjective. Maybe you guys feel differently about all that.

 

[DE4life]

It's fine bro, everyone has their own perspective on music. I don't really subscribe to the theory that metal has to be anything. I think the guys in Amaranthe are just making the music they enjoy hearing, and if it's labelled faux-metal or whatever then there isn't much they can do about that. If they wanted to go full pop route then they wouldn't have the growler/screamer in there at all, and the first two albums especially are taking huge influence from the European metal scene of the late-90s to mid-2000s. I'm sure that at least some of the members really dig bands like Soilwork, Scar Symmetry, etc... there are too many similarities for there not to be some genuine love there somewhere.

Amaranthe is on the poppier side of metal for sure, but is The Nexus any more pop-orientated than SOAPF for example? I'm not so sure, and I love that album too. Combining pop and metal doesn't bother me at all, although I know for some it's considered blasphemy. As long as it's done well and I like what I'm hearing then I could not care less what the music is labelled. I think it's kind of sad that for some people that barrier can't be pushed through. Unless it's tr00 and heavy and grimy like Insomnium or Nightrage or Amon Amarth or whatever, it's instantly unlistenable and garbage. I mean, Arch Enemy's WIll to Power is a pretty solid modern melodeath album and even that gets shit on because people don't think the female vocalist is tr00 enough and AE aren't real metal and other nonsense. I just tune it all out and enjoy whatever the fuck I want at this point.

I should also note that again I'm only talking about the first few albums that Amaranthe produced. What they put out now doesn't really interest me as it seems to have gone way more towards pop than metal and the spotlight is now very much on Elize. It may be part of the reason Jake decided to leave and try his hand with Cyhra.

 

[eochaid]

I think the guys in Amaranthe are just making the music they enjoy hearing

That was the point. What they like hearing is nothing near metal. I cannot imagine them listening to Iron Maiden or Metallica or any other metal band. And I reafirm myself. Their music is nothing special.

 

[eochaid]

Combining pop and metal doesn't bother me at all, although I know for some it's considered blasphemy. As long as it's done well and I like what I'm hearing then I could not care less what the music is labelled. I think it's kind of sad that for some people that barrier can't be pushed through.

There was a time when there was a clear difference between metal and pop. And metalheads were proud of it. We were fucking porud of it. And yes, there was a difference because it had to be a difference. Otherwise everything would be labelled pop or rick. Now bands have become whores that are seeking for mass attention of the audiences. Metal has been prostituted. Everything began with new metal and everything has gone wrong since them. When veteran bands like In Flames have tried that path... When even older bands like Priest are crying for recognition of some weirdos that do not care about metal you can see that there's something wrong.

But those bands, Amaranthe, or Cyhra, know that they would be selling shit if being a pop act because there they are average. While being metal they're something different so they can catch the attention of certain audiences and even being praised for that.

I personally don't like it and despise them for what they're doing.

 

[DE4life]

My parents were watching Top of the Pops the other night, it was a show from 1988, and Metallica, Maiden and Anthrax were all on it, so not having that it started with nu metal, sorry

 

[galvanized]

Seriously, how is Cyhra cashing in? They aren’t exploiting metal. They are trying to claim metal credibility and have marketed themselves to the metal market, yes. But if the new album turns out to have no metal then metalheads are just going to ignore them. I don’t think anyone is fooled. Only teenage girls and MILFs would be “tricked” by these “metal bad boys”.

 

[galvanized]

My parents were watching Top of the Pops the other night, it was a show from 1988, and Metallica, Maiden and Anthrax were all on it, so not having that it started with nu metal, sorry

Yeah. Classic metal is very commercial. Extreme metal though was supposed to reject all that. And that’s where most of us come from, I think.

 

[DE4life]

Yeah. Classic metal is very commercial. Extreme metal though was supposed to reject all that. And that’s where most of us come from, I think.

Probably more for you guys than for me tbh. IF were my gateway to metal but I've always been into power/European melodic metal from day one, and never cared much for the really extreme black/death metal. I don't mind the more commercial acts like Dimmu Borgir, Darkthrone, Emperor, etc... but generally speaking if it ain't got any melody and the vocals sound like toilet flushing/animal being violated I'm out

 

[galvanized]

I started in punk/hardcore so I was always looking for a “message”. Well when I discovered IF I fully embraced “big metal” (Century Media, Nuclear Blast, etc). I got a lot less ideological after that. If the music is good, it’s good.

Compare new Borknagar vs new Sabaton. Both amazing records and I love both. Very different albums, different levels of artistry, aesthetic, probably different levels of commercial ambition as well. But, if the target audience is no longer my demographic (people who appreciate metal), forget it.

If Cyhra doesn’t deliver (for me) this time I will let go. No sense me hanging on and cultivating negativity.

 

[eochaid]

Yeah. Classic metal is very commercial. Extreme metal though was supposed to reject all that. And that’s where most of us come from, I think.

Commercial? You were not living those days. Even if they were to appear in some tv show from time to time, that was not what the regular people thought about metal. Metallica was the first big mteal band to do it on the radio, and all because it was promoted by the mainstream media when they released the black album.

Listening to metal in the 80s or 90s was very "underground". People was looking at you as if you were some kind of freak and the most common sentence that you could here regarding music was "I listen to all except for the noisy one".

 

[eochaid]

My parents were watching Top of the Pops the other night, it was a show from 1988, and Metallica, Maiden and Anthrax were all on it, so not having that it started with nu metal, sorry

It did. What you mentioned it wa something like a quota. Nu Metal, along with Metallica black album, was the first time that metal was treated as mainstream music. The only exception being Scorpions and its ballads.

 

[Midas]

Can't wait. Euge is a really cool guy too. He does stuff on YouTube, and actually talks to his audience. Really a fan of his "how-to play" videos. More bands should do those and accurately describe what is being played.