Telma – Awakening Review

Details! The art of reviewing an album of a band you have never heard about is paying lots of attention to the details because they are the things that tell the most about the band’s music. Each Metal music band pays close attention to the details in order to have its own signature. Having a signature is the key to being accepted by Metal music comunity.

This Telma’s sophomore “Awakening” is all about the details I am talking about. Definitely, Telma took the road to riffsville, took the turn down at Metalville and let the Old School Heavy Metal detailing hop in. The main creative drive of “Awakening” is to wrap the band’s modern Metal music with many Metal music details, more notably Old School Heavy Metal, making of it a hodgepodge of influences. Describing it in a very simple way, from modern Metal there are the low tuned guitars and the song’s arrangements; from Old School Heavy Metal there are the vocals whose range goes far beyond the peers plus the guitars details. There are times as in tracks as “Got No Rhythm” Telma let the guitars use the squeaking that made Zakk Wilde famous, for instance. Ironically, the track called “Got No Rhythm” is the one with more rhythm’s breaks. Irony is such a thing…

“Awakening” is an album whose creative drive is to make modern Metal more palatable to Old School Heavy Metal fans and that’s why it is full of moments reviving it. For instance, the guitar techniques in “The Price of Freedom” are more than just modern Metal, they are a complex construction of many Metal music guitar techniques. Also, the fact Telma use lots of guitar solos and leads prove they intend much more with their music than modern Metal. The problem is that in tracks album opener “Crystal Clear” the guitar tones hide the complexity of what they are performing. That’s a downside of the low tones they use. In fact, there are lots of riffs and leads in the song, but they sound as one due to the tones. On the other hand, as the band’s signature there is the speeding up they do at the end of the song which they will repeat with “The Price of Freedom.”

From where I am standing, what Telma do here is very pleasant. It is no secret I am not a fan of modern Metal and the mix they do here take away much of the modern Metal stuff I do not like. Thanks to the musicians’ prowness.

will be released on February 28th via

Track Listing:

1. Crystal Clear
2. Belly of the Beast
3. Stray Dogs
4. Seventeen
5. Awakening
6. Journey of Dust
7. Got No Rythm
8. The Price of Freedom

Watch “Crystal Clear” official music video here: