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Review: The Firstborn - Lions Among Men [Album]

Rastilho Records | "It’s hard to bring something new to a genre that has been so over played, but The Firstborn should be applauded for their ef

by JoeGrave, March 20th, 2012 and has been Read 1068 times.
Last Edited by: Ffion Davies March 21st, 2012.

Portugal’s very own progressive metal rockers The Firstborn, are back with their fourth studio album, "Lions Amongst Men" featuring Luís Simões on world instruments, synth and percussion. In a never ending strive to differentiate themselves from other run of the mill metal bands, The Firstborn look at the Mahayan school of thought. The band explore deeper into the Buddhist philosophy they incorporated in the previous two albums.

Starting off with title track ‘Lions Among Men’, we are lured in by mysterious feedbacked guitars, and ominous, deep, rumbling vocals. The track takes a little while to build up, but once it gets going you are left with classic metal riffs and thunderous drums.



The rest of the album continues in the same vein of riff-tacular guitars and blitzkrieg drumming, with some good assertive break downs. But as it continues, The Firstborn's influence from Buddhist principles begins to show more in their music and not just their lyrics. ‘Vajra Eyes’ has a subtle far eastern quality to it which really starts to bring the concept together.

Venturing towards the second half of the album, tracks such as ‘Nothing Attained, Nothing Spoken’ are where Bruno Fernandes (vocals) begins to use a lighter touch, jumping between softer melodic vocals and his usual aggressive roar, or not singing at all as on instrumental closer ‘Sounds Liberated By Mantra’. While on one hand it’s a fairly nice touch and works to an extent, Bruno should stick to what he’s best at.

Overall the "Lions Amongst Men" works quite well, it’s nice to see a metal band branching out and determined to be different from the rest. Unfortunately, while this has been successful through lyrics and concept, it still sounds more or less like any other metal album.

It’s hard to bring something new to a genre that has been so over played, but The Firstborn should be applauded for their efforts.