CEMETERY SKYLINE

With the possible exception of death metal workaholic Rogga Johansson, the hardest working man in Swedish metal is Mikael Stanne. Frankly, it is hard to conceive quite where the melo-death legend gets his energy from. Aside from fronting DARK TRANQUILLITY for more than 30 years, he is also currently an active member of both iridescent supergroup THE HALO EFFECT and old-school death dealers GRAND CADAVER. Oh, and CEMETERY SKYLINE. The man must never sleep.

"Nordic Gothic" is the debut album by another all-star band of Swedish metal brothers. But while Stanne's other projects all adhere to one death metal ethos or another, CEMETERY SKYLINE is an entirely different beast. With a lineup completed by guitarist Markus Vanhala (INSOMNIUM / OMNIUM GATHERUM),  bassist Victor Brandt (WITCHERY / ex-FIRESPAWN),  drummer Vesa Ranta (THE ABBEY, SENTENCED) and keyboardist Santeri Kallio (AMORPHIS),  this could easily be another adventure in melodic death metal, but instead this belongs entirely to the world of full-bore gothic rock, with all the crushed velvet atmospherics and existential tumult that such an endeavor necessarily entails.

This is hardly unprecedented, of course. As the recent, celebrated emergence of HIGH PARASITE has proven, people absolutely love big, brash goth floor-fillers with infectious four-to-the-floor beats, lots of dark romance and artful gloom. CEMETERY SKYLINE fit that same blueprint, but where their British counterparts remain tethered to the underground, "Nordic Gothic" is polished and accessible to the point of being almost slick. As exemplified by the opening "Torn Away", Stanne is relishing the chance to explore his clean vocals with less complexity to negotiate, and his bandmates are having a wild time subverting hard rock cliches and indulging their '80s goth fantasies.

Despite a distinct lack of rough edges, CEMETERY SKYLINE still have a huge and heavy sound. "In Darkness" is an instant anthem, driven by imperious rock riffs and embellished with vast, sweeping waves of soft-focus keyboards. Stanne is a gentler presence than in his many other guises, but his clean vocals have improved beyond recognition over the last couple of decades, and there is still great power in his restrained delivery. Meanwhile, few contemporary guitarists can walk the tightrope between metal and AOR with quite the panache of Vanhala, whose solo on "In Darkness" is sublime, as are all of his lead breaks on this record.

Ultimately, these are all stylish, memorable songs with just enough bite to mitigate the overwhelming smoothness of the production. "Violent Storm" is an irresistible, up-tempo rush of hooks and morbid hokum with faint echoes of EVERGREY in its chorus; "When Silence Speaks" is the grand, tearstained showstopper, wherein CEMETERY SKYLINE embrace an almost symphonic approach to being morose; and epic closer "Alone Together" is a gloriously languid ballad with the lushness of peak '80s pop and the looming shadow of heartbreak and despair darkening its meandering path. Not everything here matches those songs' ambition, but "Nordic Gothic" is entirely successful on its own terms. The perpetually sobbing goth in all of us should appreciate a job well done. Mikael Stanne can go and have a lie down.