As a subjective fan of many different genres of music, it is an enjoyable task to sit down and listen to all of the different music that becomes available to you when you start writing reviews as I am currently doing. What is not enjoyable, however, is when something with immense potential comes across the table that just fails to hit the mark. This is one of those times.

"Refugium" is the second full length album released by the Austrian band ANOMALIE, the side project of Marrok, guitarist for the Austrian metal band Selbstenteibung. Released November 20^th of this year by Art of Propaganda records as a follow up to 2014's "Between the Light", "Refugium" engulfs it listener with repetitive harmonies, lackluster vocals, and lyrical content devoid of any real substance.

Musically speaking, "Refugium" is excellent. Every song has hard driving melodies, nuanced solos and in some cases some amazing harmonized acoustic intro's and outro's. Each song flows brilliantly into the next. Where the music falls apart though is the vocals and lack of lyrical substance. Listening to the vocalist at times is almost cringe worthy as he seems to struggle through various portions of the songs. And reading through the lyrics of the songs seems akin to reading through the dark poetry of a 13 year old wrist slasher. While "Refugium" presents 8 songs to the listener in reality it seems to be one 50 minute long suicide note. Listening to this album at times it almost seems as though the vocals were an afterthought, just slapped on top of some preexisting music. There is no cohesiveness between the music and vocals, it is non-existent.

It pains me to have to write such glaring words about an album, and a group, that hold such potential. As a fan of rock music, and all of its bastard children, I have nothing but the utmost respect for any artist who pours their blood, sweat, and tears into a piece of art, then releases it to the unrelenting masses. Even through my disdain for this album, I urge you, the unrelenting masses, to give this album a listen. Because even through veil of disappointment this album projects, there is still a raw, unadulterated, pure metal backing to it that deserves your attention.