Band:	Posthuman
Album:	Rise From Ruins
Style:	Melodic death metal
Release date:	June 2010

01. Intro
02. A Planet's Lament
03. (2108 Pt. 1) World In Flames
04. Darkest Lies
05. End Of My Trail
06. (2108 Pt. 2) Truce
07. The Meaning Of Death
08. Into The Void
09. (2108 Pt. 3) The Great Revolt
10. Ashes To Ashes

Modern Melodic Death metal
Recorded: Boss Hog Studio, The Netherlands 2009
Unsigned/Self-released
Total Running Time: 43:59


Meet Posthuman, the new guys on the melodic death metal block. Instead of chasing trends the band opted for the more Swedish-sounding melodic death metal recipe, decided to add some more flavor, forgot to count the spoons of sugar and ended up with the highly melodic album, Rise From Ruins. Though by adding sophistication, variation and a little dose of progressiveness to the compositions, Posthuman partially avoids the obvious mousetraps. The result is a fairly original sounding effort - considering the genre - by a band that is neither catchy nor cheesy nor annoyingly syrupy. Still, there's no reason to get overly excited.

Because Posthuman is also a band not afraid to try something different. Which is why they turned Rise From Ruins into a futuristic concept album. This is really a concept album by the numbers, meaning the tracks unravel some sort of backstory about the end of mankind. Also meaning the album's overall flow gets disrupted with intermissions, plenty of movie/news/god-knows-what samples, futuristic jingles and other excessive synthesizer effects to simulate a post-apocalyptic atmosphere.

Aside from working out all the details of the concept's plot, the band also paid a lot of attention to the vocal section. Miscellaneous vocals are supposed to be one of the strong points of the album but will take a hefty dose of commitment to fully appreciate. Especially the clean vocals might have the horrible tendency to push your buttons. The final track also features a 17-piece grunt choir; a good idea on paper that unfortunately doesn't live up to the expectations. Reasons to stick around till the very end have gradually diminished.

Posthuman sure made it hard on themselves with this debut. While the music itself contains enough electricity to knock down a giraffe, there are (too) many distractions, layers and challenges to get under your belt. Cards on the table, I'm not really sure what to make of all this. The band scores above-average without making much impression... and therefore bound to fade quickly in the collective metal memory.