My old Italian love SINOATH is back again with a new album. All of you who read the interview that I did with them for Voices From The Darkside should know how much I love this band. So, what can we expect from “Under The Ashes”? Is it my expected mix between “Forged In Blood” and “Still In The Grey Dying” (in my eyes still 2 of the best Death Metal demos ever recorded) or the feared 2nd edition of the rather lame “Research” album? To be honest, nothing of both! On their myspace-page the band writes something like “55 minutes of cold macabre Doom Black Metal” and “the target to getting better than the “Forged In Blood” periods was completely scored”. Hm, now I’m kinda confused, because I wouldn’t describe this new output of SINOATH using words as “cold macabre Doom Black Metal” and I see no link at all to the “Forged In Blood” period. This starts kinda negative, but it is not supposed to be that because “Under The Ashes” is a very good album, unfortunately not the one I expected and definitely not the one I waited for. To be honest this is nothing else than my personal problem because I’m a narrow-minded fart living only in the past, haha. Let’s skip the past of SINOATH and see “Under The Ashes” as what it is, an album of an original band. What we get is melodic Death Metal (perhaps with hints of Black Metal, to show some kind of democracy) with a permanent use of keyboards. The strange thing here is that the guys used only 70s instruments to record this album and therefore this record sounds in a way kinda old-fashioned and not brutal or heavy in the common sense of the word at all, though I’m sure it was never their intention to be brutal and heavy. This is a really original kind of Metal with a great guitar sound which I’m sure I haven’t heard often before and a way to use keyboards which is utterly outstanding. If I should compare this record with one band than I’d say “Under The Ashes” is, to be really careful, something like a mix between TIAMAT’s “Astral Sleep” minus their gloominess of this time and – fuck, I have to correct me – a hint of “Forged In Blood”. This album takes time as it is not what you expect from an album which you usually buy in 2008, still it is everything else than old-fashioned. From time to time it is a tough job to write reviews, because an album like this is very hard to describe, haha. After listening to “Under The Ashes” approx. 20 times I can say that this is a fuckin’ awesome album, outstanding, original and something completely different, with great riffs, great melodies and awesome songs as ‘Burn The Stars’ or ‘Come To The Sabbath’. If you are looking for another “Forged In Blood” or “Still In The Grey Dying” than you are wrong here, if you are looking out for something different then feel free to try this. Check out www.elegymusic.com, www.myspace.com/sinoath or get in touch with Salvatore directly at elegy_hawk@hotmail.com.