'Building Up The Apathy' starts with "World's End" which gives the listener a first impression about the variety to be found on the album. The main structure of the song is rather complicated but there are some harmonic and epic moments which - along with virtuosic instrumental passages - are the highlights of the song. One thing to remark here are also the lyrics of the song dealing with, you might have already guessed it, the end of the world and I think the atmosphere of the whole song fits very well with the lyrics. The song to follow, "Distorted", shows again how diversified the band composes their songs. Calmer parts are fading into almost furious and aggressive parts (I might have heard some attempts of growling there?), but the overall balance is kept without exaggerating it. On this album full of highlights the next song "Once Lost Life" came out as to be one of my favorite tracks. Just listen to the very catchy chorus and you will know why. Here I'd recommend again to pick up the booklet and read the lyrics. The structure of "Once Lost Life" is maybe a bit less complicated than the rest of the album but therefore I like the vocals here very much which come out very strong. Besides I absolutely love the solos in the second half! This is what I call a perfect blend of progressive and power metal. Now, slowly approaching the middle part of the album, one has to find out that the aforementioned variety does not stick out that much anymore. "Blood Of Eden" is a song with a whiff of the epic atmosphere to be found every now and then. These are probably the two words to describe the song best, 'epic' and 'atmospheric'. Less weight has been put on complicated compositions but on atmosphere!

In order to continue the path of... yes variety - what else - ? on this album the song to follow belongs to the faster category again. "Corridors" convinces with a powerful chorus and some great instrumental passages again. What would an album be without at least one ballad? Here it is. "Hollowed" is the softest song on the album without any complicated instrumental stuff whatsoever. Maybe a bit likewise Dream Theater's "Space-Dye Vest" or "The Silent Man" ... you get the idea. But I really don't like comparisons of that kind anyway. "The Realm Of Flames" shows us quite the difference again. It's faster and heavier again and all in all well-composed but doesn't show too much new elements anymore. Even if the song is overall good itself - if I had to pick one song I liked least on this album, this one would be my choice. My second favorite however is the last song, the only one exceeding the 10-minutes limit on the album. "Into The Flow" marks maybe the highlight of the whole album. The chorus is fantastic, energetic and to make it short, here you can find basically everything the band has to offer musically.

So one can conclude by the word I probably used most in this review what the album is all about: variety. A very important factor to make an album interesting and not too boring. If you like progmetal, there is no way around this album, that's for sure. The songs are well composed, the production is good, the band is good - great progression.

written by Silence

Playing time: 59.53