Mystfall – Celestial Vision
Release Date: 21st July 2023
Label: Scarlet Records
Bandcamp
Genre: Symphonic Metal, Gothic Metal.
FFO: Nightwish, Epica, Within Temptation, Xandria, Two Steps from Hell.
Review By: Mark Waight
Celestial Vision is the eagerly awaited debut album from Greek Symphonic/Gothic Metal band Mystfall. Celestial Vision is a superbly crafted album with elements of Celtic, Cinematic and Classical music fused with beautiful operatic style vocals, allowing Mystfall to deliver a spellbinding and enchanting first release that will instantly captivate your interest.
Mystfall is Marialena Trikoglou (vocals), Kostas Mexis (vocals), Panagiotis Leontaritis (guitar), Dida Racotoarison (keyboards), Antonis Desousis (bass) and Manos Agouridis (drums).
Resting Heaven is a cinematic style orchestral introduction that slowly builds up your anticipation of what’s to come. The band then unleash the title track, Celestial Vision, and it’s everything that you would expect and more. Choral and Operatic vocals are beautifully blended, with occasional brutal male vocals. The soundtrack is just divine, with fabulous orchestral arrangements sprinkled with just enough Metal to add some real bite.
Centuries continues in the same vein with a very bold and heavy theme underpinning cathedral filling choral and angelic vocals. This is music of truly epic proportions that fills every corner of your mind with the wonderful soundwaves of another thrilling musical journey.
Hard and heavy riffing track Endless has a much more traditional flavour to it, very much reminding me of early Nightwish. It is a wonderfully crafted and superb piece of music! Silence is a much softer and gentler song altogether. A beautiful piano passage slowly leads into the most vocally outstanding track on the entire album, with moments of such pure serenity that it will move you to tears. Truly magical and my favourite track!
Kings of Utopia picks up the pace and heaviness, with pure metal flowing through it from start to finish. This super tight performance with excellent changes in tempo demonstrates what an accomplished group of musicians Mystfall are.
The hauntingly dark Moral Compass has a very much more gothic feel to the music. There are echoes of doom running right through to the core of this composition, with the vocals fully complimenting the atmosphere created with just the right amount of fragility and vulnerability. This is a very special tune indeed!
The Balance of Time pitches the beautiful lyric soprano vocals of Marialena Trikoglou against the brutal male vocals of Kostas Mexis in that age-old battle of light vs dark, good vs evil. It is expertly delivered, with just the right amount of balance between the two being played out over a spot-on orchestral arrangement.
There is a hint of a Middle Eastern theme to Freedom Path, which is a fast-paced curtain closer to complete a very memorable introduction to the very talented Mystfall. What a great way to finish what is hard to believe the band’s debut album as they sound so accomplished!
Celestial Vision by Mystfall is a must-have album for any fans out there of Symphonic or Gothic Metal, and I’m sure they are set to have a great future with music of this quality. Celestial Vision is such an outstanding debut album that Mystfall have already set the bar very high for themselves and any future compositions they may write.
I can’t wait to see what Mystfall do next, and now that they are firmly on my radar, I will make sure I keep an eye out for any future releases. Until then, all I can say is that Celestial Vision comes highly recommended.
(4.5 / 5)
