Children of Bodom - Follow the Reaper

Black metal with the happiest keyboards the genre has ever seen, yet still uncompromisingly brutal. "Children of Decadence" could be Emerson, Lake & Palmer, for the love of Beelzebub; such is the level of complexity and prominence of synthesizers. The frightening Finnish fivesome does a nice job of mixing up tempos on this, the band's third studio disc, and manages to keep up the intensity in spite of (or maybe because of) the aural auditory mood swings. You won't even recognize the bonus track cover "Hellion," and it doesn't even matter. Read More