It was not long ago that I found out about the first metal band that came from Andorra. That band was NAMI with their debut album "Fragile Alignments". An album of awesome melodic progressive death metal with exceptional compositions and crystal clear production that in my opinion was of the best albums of that year. As such my expectations for NAMI were really high and the anticipation for new material was more than eager. Eventually, after two years "The Eternal Light of the Unconscious Mind" is released. As in the first album the songs follow a specific concept. "The Eternal Light of the Unconscious Mind" is about dreams and the unconscious and as it seems this kind of metaphysical and fantastic themes really suits the musical style of NAMI. The artwork is magnificent and handled by Alberto S. Ballasteros as in the first album. It has nine songs and a total duration of fifty three minutes.

From the opener song "The Beholders" the evolution in the musical style of the band is profound. There is a change towards more melodic/atmospheric patterns with slower speed. The vocals remain brutal on most parts of the songs but there is not so much brutality as in the first record. On the second song "Ariadna" the changes are more obvious as a saxophone is giving an interesting vibe to the song. "Silent Mouth" is also following the same structure style but is having one of the best riffs of the album when it comes to the heavy part. "Hunter's Dormancy" is one of the heaviest moments of the record. The next four songs, "The Animal and The Golden Throne", "Bless of Faintness", "Hope in Faintness" and "Crimson Sky" have in their majority clean parts and the first of them is actually the weakest song of the album. "The Dream Eater" is the final and largest composition of the album with lots of heavy parts and a few outburst combined with saxophone.

Be it the great anticipation or the very high expectations I had for NAMI I have to say that "The Eternal Light of the Unconscious Mind" didn't turn out to be the record I expected. Looking back to "Fragile Alignments" the best element of the album was the combination of very raw and brutal parts with mellow and atmospheric ones plus an amazing production. Everything was sounding crystal clear and very organic and I wish that lots of albums could have that sound. The new album focuses more on mellow atmosphere with lots of clean parts. Doing that the technical parts were significantly reduced to follow the new musical direction. Even when the brutal parts are used the parts are not very heavy and fast. I do not know if this was done intentionally to contradict the first very heavy album but to me it seems that NAMI tried to soften their sound very quickly. I find nothing wrong with having a softer sound or experimenting - as in fact I really appreciated the saxophone for instance - but something doesn't feel right. Also the production has changed to help the new direction but it is a step lower than the production of the first album.

So what is "The Eternal Light of the Unconscious Mind" eventually? It is a good record with, interesting compositions and a cool lyrical concept. Clean parts are favored over brutal outbursts as the band aims to present the world of Morpheus through their music. There are some technical parts but most of the record is really streamlined. Eventually, NAMI have tried hard as artists to create a different album than their first one and that is really respected as most of artists play safe, however I think that the final result is having some vague moments and doesn't surpass their debut album. It would be unfair to say that in just an album they have stopped to be good musicians or a promising band. But only time will tell if they are still looking for their characteristic sound or they are happy with their current musical direction and keep on their new path.

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