Resonance Room saw the light in 2003, and two demos (and six years) later, their debut has been released. Lately, I'm truly being educated in creative genre compounds. Today, it's "emotional gothic doom" also able to "satisfy progressive metal fans". Sounds sweet on paper, alright.
First of all, I'm amazed that the description - to a certain extent - actually makes sense, too. It's Doom married to Gothic, the latter slipping off with Progressive now and then. The songs vary from a pushing beat to slow, silencing tempos, while Alessandro's vocals can be both powerfully clean and soothingly emotional. Together with the singing, it's the arrangement of stringed instruments that emphasize and determine the feel. The guitars can deploy steady, heavy rhythms, weeping melodies, or typical gothic chord runs. On top of those, the keyboard influences the atmosphere a great deal, especially on its most extreme moments: from synth/electro to plain piano... or silence. The eleven tracks feel mostly gothic, but the doom element is everpresent. Oh yeah, I almost forgot the prog part. Too bad, but that could've been left out. In the frist track ("Escape") I witnessed two 'copy-paste' passages that felt progressive, but didn't have any right to be in that song... or on the album. Luckily, Resonance Room cut the crap in later songs, and the most prog I heard were a few vocal lines and irregular beats. Cool stuff, but quite standard (read: necessary) to keep anyone from snoring before the end.
To finish things up: Resonance Room can certainly make a merit of "Unspoken" - great production, good atmosphere, and despite the 'lifelessness' of the genre (and RR's interpretation of it), entertaining music still.
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AUTHOR: Goran
Goran has been an active reviewer for years (since the old Fishcomcollective, to the brand new Corazine - and also for Face Your Underground). He enjoys - besides metal - the creative side of life, be it through music, sports, programming or 3D. You can find him at www.myspace.com/fdemets.