Music surprises you more often than you expect it to. Especially in Metal, when you have so many sub-genres of music, you often go into an album with a pre-determined notion of what to expect and get surprised every now and then. That's exactly what happened to me as I listened to Switzerland's Melodic Death Metal band ATROPAS's 2^nd full-length, "Episodes Of Solitude", which released on September 4^th.

The band has a very distinct sound that I haven't listened to in the past. While it is mainly Melodic Death Metal, there are shades of symphonic and core elements found all throughout. Due to the progressive nature of the music here, it is difficult to describe to perfection what music is offered here, though I shall make an attempt here. The album starts with "Molotov" which brings in riffs and screams from the Metalcore genre and mixes them along with the songwriting style of Melodic Death Metal. "Lost Between Worlds" tries to tell a story of a post-apocalyptic world, and the song oscillates between heavy and the melodic parts beautifully as it ends in a soothing instrumental keyboard sound. I must say, ATROPAS has used the keyboard more beautifully than some of the bigger known bands out there. The most interesting part here is, as I listen to the record, I wonder where the band draws their musical influences from; I simply can't think of any! "Take Me Home" is a rhythmic and melodic song, as the clean vocals make magic along with the keyboard and guitar work. "Hit The Floor" has a groovy vibe to it making it a perfect song for the band's live shows. The album has lyrical content full of hatred and pain towards society and life itself, and is beautifully played along musically. As the albums progresses towards the end, it gets groovier and heavier, while still managing to maintain the melodic parts. The album ends with a melodic and atmospheric keyboard driven song in "Closure".

If you are feeling experimental with new music and are obsessed with the dozens of sub-genre names in Heavy Metal, you should try this, "Episodes of Solitude" surprised me, as it brought something fresh and interesting in each song, and this is the conservative Metalhead in me speaking, so I guess more people should dig this.<