Lacuna Coil - Broken Crown Halo (2014) (Ltd. Edition CD+DVD)

Posted By: apocalipsys2014

Date: April 16, 2014

Where to begin with this review? Let's first evaluate the feelings you had for Dark Adrenaline. If you liked it, then examine what your expectations are for another Lacuna Coil album. If you projected the band would follow their trend, then this is exactly what you will get; Broken Crown Halo is an accessible modern metal album employing the formula "if it ain't broke, don't fix it". With that being said, and once you come to terms with that the gothic genre tag really hasn't applied to Lacuna Coil over the last couple of years, you probably will enjoy this album; I do. Broken Crown Halo's sound is a natural progression from their prior release. While the overall vibe of the new album followed its predecessor's blueprint, it also brought back some of the darker (gothic) elements. This sure will please some of the old-timers, but musically Lacuna Coil didn't reach too far back and the new album will speak to a wider audience once again. The album starts off with the catchy tune "Nothing Stands In Our Way", which could easily describe the direction the band took with this release. At this point in their career Lacuna Coil doesn't have to conform to set standards, but are free to explore and follow their own path. Hopefully "Victims", which for me is one of the highlights on Broken Crown Halo, is the route the band will choose from hence forth. Not only does Cristina sing in her usual high feminine voice, but she also pulls off a somewhat Stevie Nicks (Fleetwood Mac) impersonation, while Andrea almost screams his vocal parts; very cool song. Another highlight on the album would be "Zombies" with its much appreciated guitar solo. Or "Die & Rise" for this matter, where Cristina sing parts of the song in her native language, albeit Korn would also be proud of that intro riff. No big surprise here, the downtuned distortion practice is nothing new for Lacuna Coil, but it seems there is more of it this time around. While the band was never known for their "beauty-and-the-beast" vocal passages, the scattered death metal low growls of Andrea are a welcome sound throughout the album. Vocal wise, nothing really has to be explained about the dynamics between him and Cristina; they click on all levels and it sounds great as usual. Not necessarily fillers, but the middle section of the album could be a bit stronger in my opinion, but then they come back with "I Burn In You" which features some familiar Egyptian characteristics. The album ends with the rather dark, but also very emotional and moving ballad, "One Cold Day". I am glad this song was put at the end of Broken Crown Halo since anywhere else it would have disrupted the flow of this, yet again, very well produced album. So, as stated in the beginning, depending on your expectations of Lacuna Coil anno 2014, you will either chalk them off as another band which went "radio friendly", or you will love their new album.

www.metal-archives.com

Musicians:

Vocals : Cristina Scabbia
Vocals : Andrea Ferro
Guitars : Marco Biazzi
Guitars : Cristiano Migliore
Bass, Keyboards : Marco Coti Zelati
Drums : Cristiano Mozzati

Track List:

01. Nothing Stands In Our Way [4:08]
02. Zombies [3:47]
03. Hostage To The Light [3:56]
04. Victims [4:32]
05. Die & Rise [3:45]
06. I Forgive (But I Won't Forget Your Name) [3:56]
07. Cybersleep [4:26]
08. Infection [4:23]
09. I Burn In You [4:15]
10. In The End I Feel Alive [4:21]
11. One Cold Day [6:10]

Endgame: In The Shadow Of The Crown (DVD)
1. Chapter 1: Pawn takes Rook
2. Chapter 2: Beyond The Queen
3. Chapter 3: Introducing The Bishop
4. Chapter 4: Knights At The Ready
5. Chapter 5: Sicilian Defense
6. Chapter 6: The Queen’s Gambit
7. Chapter 7: The Castled King
8. Chapter 8: The Stonewall
9. Chapter 9: Endgame

EAC extraction logfile

Exact Audio Copy V1.0 beta 3 from 29. August 2011

EAC extraction logfile from 11. April 2014, 16:46

Lacuna Coil / Broken Crown Halo (Ltd. Ed.)

Used drive : HL-DT-STDVD-RAM GH22LS30 Adapter: 1 ID: 1

Read mode : Secure
Utilize accurate stream : Yes
Defeat audio cache : Yes
Make use of C2 pointers : No

Read offset correction : 102
Overread into Lead-In and Lead-Out : No
Fill up missing offset samples with silence : Yes
Delete leading and trailing silent blocks : No
Null samples used in CRC calculations : Yes
Used interface : Native Win32 interface for Win NT & 2000

Used output format : User Defined Encoder
Selected bitrate : 896 kBit/s
Quality : High
Add ID3 tag : No
Command line compressor : C:\Program Files (x86)\FLAC\flac.exe
Additional command line options : -6 -V %source%

TOC of the extracted CD

Track | Start | Length | Start sector | End sector
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––-
1 | 0:00.00 | 4:07.43 | 0 | 18567
2 | 4:07.43 | 3:47.33 | 18568 | 35625
3 | 7:55.01 | 3:56.02 | 35626 | 53327
4 | 11:51.03 | 4:31.60 | 53328 | 73712
5 | 16:22.63 | 3:44.58 | 73713 | 90570
6 | 20:07.46 | 3:56.17 | 90571 | 108287
7 | 24:03.63 | 4:26.14 | 108288 | 128251
8 | 28:30.02 | 4:23.07 | 128252 | 147983
9 | 32:53.09 | 4:15.20 | 147984 | 167128
10 | 37:08.29 | 4:21.27 | 167129 | 186730
11 | 41:29.56 | 6:09.54 | 186731 | 214459

Range status and errors

Selected range

Filename F:\Lacuna Coil - Broken Crown Halo (Ltd. Ed.).wav

Peak level 97.7 %
Extraction speed 2.5 X
Range quality 100.0 %
Test CRC 9ED6D8DC
Copy CRC 9ED6D8DC
Copy OK

No errors occurred

AccurateRip summary

Track 1 accurately ripped (confidence 2) [E3546DBB] (AR v2)
Track 2 accurately ripped (confidence 2) [D769DA03] (AR v2)
Track 3 accurately ripped (confidence 2) [167C9B3A] (AR v2)
Track 4 accurately ripped (confidence 2) [A287453E] (AR v2)
Track 5 accurately ripped (confidence 2) [3FB3A0C9] (AR v2)
Track 6 accurately ripped (confidence 2) [1614EAAE] (AR v2)
Track 7 accurately ripped (confidence 2) [867D52D0] (AR v2)
Track 8 accurately ripped (confidence 2) [70E90885] (AR v2)
Track 9 accurately ripped (confidence 2) [24709CEE] (AR v2)
Track 10 accurately ripped (confidence 2) [8BF2E4BF] (AR v2)
Track 11 accurately ripped (confidence 2) [53009CDB] (AR v2)

All tracks accurately ripped

End of status report

–– CUETools DB Plugin V2.1.4

[CTDB TOCID: QiswFKh5Ms5pphZmmC_k4QWXVhw-] found
Submit result: QiswFKh5Ms5pphZmmC_k4QWXVhw- has been confirmed
Track | CTDB Status
1 | (15/15) Accurately ripped
2 | (15/15) Accurately ripped
3 | (15/15) Accurately ripped
4 | (15/15) Accurately ripped
5 | (15/15) Accurately ripped
6 | (15/15) Accurately ripped
7 | (15/15) Accurately ripped
8 | (15/15) Accurately ripped
9 | (15/15) Accurately ripped
10 | (15/15) Accurately ripped
11 | (15/15) Accurately ripped

==== Log checksum 6C82EADFBD416A427F79A82FCF0A9A56122566AFFFFEA8241F81C76F87056A30 ====

Not my rip, not my scan-job. Thx very much to the original uploader Psicosis [MMT]!
5% WinRar Recovery Record for all files.
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