© Century Media 2002
DARK TRANQUILLITY
Damage Done
And yet another chapter in the ever aging DARK TRANQUILLITY story is written as the band release their...um...how many is it now? 9 releases in total? Well, they're surely an accomplished band and as the years have passed we've seen them rely more on the stronger emotional tones and atmospheres, toning down the traditional Swedish Metal/Gothenberg clichés. After the band's last release I was pondering how they could expand upon their current style. Would they come full circle? Would they experiment? Were we all in for some new exotic chemistry? The answer is essentially 'no' to all these questions. To some degree they have returned to more of their fundamental and elemental attributes of the late 1990's but there is no mistaking that this is the one, the only, DARK TRANQUILLITY.I personally wanted to hear the band come around again to what they'd done on Projector. Sadly, while there are a lot of qualities on this that one could compare with that album, the band have truly abandoned any attempts at clean vocals and they don't quite exhibit the same emotion this time around. Damage Done is certainly nothing harboring any surprises, which for many might just be great news. However, I think given how they've evolved to this point it would not be out of line to expect to hear something a bit more creative than what is offered up on Damage Done. I don't mean to sound like I'm bashing, I just want to make it perfectly clear that when you buy this album, which you most certainly will no matter what any of us have to say about it, to not expect some new novel chemistry to emerge. This is meat and potatoes DT and they still do what they do very well, even if the end result is just another decent album.
The band do in fact hit the mark well on a few tracks like the aggressive opener, "Final Resistance", the excellent "Single Part Of Two" and the delightfully dark and unsettling instrumental closer, "Ex Nihilo". The production qualities are again too, top notch as always. I do appreciate the fact that the band again found the time to write some speedier numbers this time out. Haven lacked that and its a welcome return to form for the band on Damage Done.
In the final judgment, Damage Done is a good release but definitely not the band's most impressive by any stretch. It may be a fact of the times that the band have seen their better days come and go. They seemed to hit their peak in the late 1990's and sound as if they need a refreshing new direction or some new element of inspiration to keep the masses in tow. Its likely we'll be waiting another couple of years before we find out what happens next.
