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The three ladies and two guys in Miseria hail from Finland and play a very melodic brand of gothic metal. Lost Forever, their newest release, consists of three songs and was released to help the band secure its goal of signing a record deal. The band has an undeniably Finnish sound, with lots of happy melodies and layers of cheesy keyboards all throughout the songs. Vocal duties are shared between Virpi Äkkinen and Joni Kantoniemi, who both are very competent. The male vocals are either growled or sung while the female vocals are beautiful and quite forceful. Too often vocalists in female fronted bands tend to shy away from using all of their voice, but luckily Miseria do not fall into this trap.
The end result of all of this is very enjoyable. The songs are catchy yet retain a heavy edge thanks to the use of death growls. The title track is the best of the three, with excellent vocal and keyboard work and a chorus that immediately sticks in the listener’s head. “Bitter Faith” makes use of Joni’s death vocals and is an excellent study in contrasting female and male vocals. The only problem I had with the song is that it uses pretty much the same melody for the whole song. Some variations on the main theme would have made a good song great. “Cruel Fairytale” is very similar to “Bitter Faith” in that it also has a strong melody that is a bit overused. However, these faults do not detract too much from what is a very solid release. Record labels should take notice; Miseria are a band with a bright future that definitely deserve a record deal.
| Tracklist |
| 1. Lost Forever |
| 2. Bitter Faith |
| 3. Cruel Fairytale |
: 10.51
| Buy other Miseria albums |
