Lo and behold! As for me SCREAM SILENCE was a band playing music with a certain demand but they seemingly forgot to produce albums on a continuously high level while dying in beauty. Single songs and passages attracted attention but altogether, their records were not coherent enough, not enough to the point, so that I did not wanted to develop a lasting interest in the band.
As more I was surprised (I actually still am) when I was listening to the brand new and sixth album Aphelia. Not only that I extremely liked it with the first run, no, it keeps on growing with every new spin. It still does!
Of course, SCREAM SILENCE are still the specialists for the more romantically touched version of Gothic and Dark Rock. Said, they attach more importance on atmosphere and melodies than rockin’ guitar work and heavily pitched singing. But this time they varied the styles they are ranging in more skillfully than on the previous albums. Especially trips into the harder regions of GothRock support the overall impression very well. Aphelia get across so damn convincing as if SCREAM SILENCE never did anything else…
Exceptionally great the unbelievable congeries of feastful melodies are, which almost appear with a soundtrack-like mood and even gets amplified with the direct changeovers between the track, and the huge amount of variety. Stylistic tangle gets cleverly avoided and so one of these rare albums got created that does not display any flaw, but instead teems with enchanting moments and musical maturation.
As examples for this conclusion I would like to recommend the rocking tracks Harvest and The Vitriol, and the more dreamy and adjuratory songs Nothingness, My Eyes or the almost 13 minutes running epos Aphelia. Despite of the musical variety SCREAM SILENCE still consequently follow their style and stay identifiable. Here I pay the Berlin guys a compliment! That’s a demand on which too many bands (still) fail…
The limited edition of Aphelia comes with 3 live bonus tracks, recorded during a show in Berlin’s K17 in 2006. They are ok but would have loved more new material instead. However, I splash out phat 9.5 points, SCREAM SILENCE have very well deserved with Aphelia!