BEHOLDER – Lethal Injection

Without any comparison to Beholder’s earlier albums, no doubt, Lethal Injection sure does strange things to your veins! Listen to this album in the car and you never know what might happen! Listen to it before you go to bed and you’ll never go to sleep!

The album requires a lot of listening in order to fully appreciate it! At first you might find it freaky and even scary, but then listen to the lyrics and all the special effects they have used … you’ll likely find yourself in amazement. The theme of the album is mainly Stephen King’s thriller The Shining, therefore, the scary sounds and lyrics.

This is the band’s third album, and it’s clear they’re all good musicians to have made it this far, but it is a bit confusing trying to put the band and this album into a certain genre. Beholder has a very individual and unique sound, and female singer Leanan Sidhe is the cream of the crop!! Her voice and sound is kind of Evanescence and Nightwish-ish! Her almost sulky endings could even make you think Sinead O’Connor goes Heavy Metal! Unfortunately, Patrick Wires’ voice doesn’t impress as much. Even though some of the songs clearly are written for his voice, he sounds a bit flat and hard. So Beholder could definitely commercialize themselves a bit and leave more of the singing to Miss Leanan.

One of the songs that especially needs mentioning is “Mr Grady” — the total highlight of the album — containing a minute of incredible and intriguing calm singing by both vocalists! Just that minute alone makes the record worth buying! Also, “Daydream,” where they sing together, is a great song, with a 1980’s Heavy Metal chorus … it’s not very typical compared to the rest of the album.

Patrick Wire impresses with the song “Blackout of Mind.” He shows a bit of the rawness in his voice and that suits him so much better!

Also a huge “+” for the goddamn creative guitar and keyboard work. It’s quite rare to hear songs this tight, with such terrific guitar play and innovative keyboards. Applause goes out to Markus Mayer on guitars and Mark Vikar on keyboards, for sure.

Labyrinth’s front man, Roberto Tiranti, was brought in for the Power ballad “Far Away,” but he has a typical Italian accent, and for some reason he sings the song with a shivering voice and it actually sounds quite pathetic. Patrick Wire could have done the song better himself, because it’s really an enchanting and sweet song.

The last song on the album called “Lethal Injection – Part One: The Executioner” and “Part two: Crying to God,” is probably the worst on the album. It’s too creative and too fast and has a psycho piano ending! It kind of makes you scratch your head (and balls!) and wonder what just happened here! A total Lethal Injection!!