In this year’s summer I saw BENEATH FLOWERS opening for the Franconian Metal Night with an impressing stage performance by singer Stefan Banz. Founded back in 2003 the debut demo First Steps... In Light (which is already sold out - but soon to be pressed again) of the newcomer from the south of Germany arrived my desktop.
Musically the band tries to combine sophisticated progressive and melodic death metal in the veins of legendary Opeth with the deeply sad melancholy of My Dying Bride’s own, finding its impression in alternating growls and clean singing, partly quite tricky arrangements and melodies, as well as gloomily solemn acoustic parts.
While listening to First Steps... In Light without the visual dramatic art and the live feeling failings are now more significantly noticeable. First of all there is to mention the clean sung passages where singer Stefan often does not hit the right tone, especially when he slightly lifts up his voice. Another point of criticism has to be the song structures, which are quite predictable since their are close to the musical archetypes. So there are no surprising moments. Furthermore some of the tempi changes and breaks are too bumpy and scatterbrained. The band left much room to improve themselves and to polish up their songwriting.
Nevertheless, the all over impression is quite good and BENEATH FLOWERS can convince with their 6 track demo. The members have ambitious goals, lot of potential and enough time to let off steam. Well-done! Thumbs up!
The demo CD can still be ordered via the band’s website.