Sometimes, we need to review our convictions and ideas about Metal and its genres. We can have some combinations of elements that aren't really evident, and we get trapped in a wrong point of view. It's a matter of experience to deal in a correct way with bands as the Finnish quintet FINAL VOID. Their first album, called "Sounds of Absence", can trick your senses.

Their musical genre is hard to define. We have some influences from what some call Gothic Metal (personally, I don't like this name, because it gives the wrong idea about Gothic Rock is about). But we feel accessible melodic influences from Hard Rock in some moments (due the fact that some of them were member of a band in such genre), but as some grunts appear, we feel the essence of earlier Doom Death Metal from PARADISE LOST in these moments, as some melancholy from later works from SENTENCED. Their introspective melodies are fine, the heavy and aggressive extreme dose as well, then we can say that, whatever you call their style, it's very good.

A key for their work is a very good sound quality, clean and heavy as they need, and it fits in a fine way on their musical work. It's heavy to keep the weight, but with a clean aesthetics. The instrumental tunes were chosen carefully, both on clean moments as in the harsh ones. On "One Certain Son" and on "Dianthus", the band uses very good melodies with fine guitars and vocals (on the second one, an accessible touch can be felt along with some guttural vocals). On "Thoreau", that introspective and melancholic feeling is presented, with fine clean voices contrasting with nasty grunts. But on "For You", that same melodic essence pulses clearly, remind a bit that Melodic Death Metal used by Finnish bands, as it is again on "Journey" (that has some catchy melodies in the guitars, but showing a fine work from bass guitar and drums), and the long and melodic "The Day You Sold Your Heart" is a compilation of all their musical elements on one song, showing aggressive parts along with melodic and melancholic ones.

Their work is really very good in this early stage, so we hope that FINAL VOID would keep on, and that "Sounds of Absence" will be the first among many albums in the future.