Album review: Horizon Ignited – Towards The Dying Lands

In melodic death metal, it’s easier to sound big than bold. Too often, emerging hopefuls, pretenders to a throne with precious few past occupants, tick off hallmarks rather than using them as base elements with which to do something pioneering. The question, then, is whether Finnish sextet Horizon Ignited are any different. This second album provides a compelling case in their favour, even if it takes a while to make the point.

Opener Beyond Your Reach doesn’t exactly blow the door off the room marked ‘originality’, and is more admirable for its craft – particularly Okko Solanterä’s vocal dexterity – than the overall result. Second track, Servant, is a similar story; its tempo provides arresting moments of discombobulation, but for the most part the heavy and melodic moments savage and soar just as you expect. It’s the same with the title-track. So far, so familiar, you’re thinking – not just because of their inability to surprise, but because these were three of the four tracks shared ahead of the album’s release.

Perhaps it’s a case of familiarity breeding contempt, but once that opening trio is out of the way, proceedings begin to loosen up. It may simply be that the songs are just better, richer, more ambitious compositions, like the chest-beating Aching Wings and the striding Fall Apart, confidently vying for their own space and place. Whatever the reason, it comes as a welcome relief and an even more welcome surprise. The problem then, of course, is that when the going is this good, you resent Towards The Dying Lands clocking in at less than 40 minutes. Next time around, then, let’s hope Horizon Ignited get out of the blocks quicker and stick around longer.

Verdict: 3/5

For fans of: In Flames, Insomnium, Soilwork

Towards The Dying Lands is released on July 1 via Nuclear Blast