Review by Adam M on October 14, 2010.

This is a spirited metal effort that has a lot of energy. The songs carry an impact from one track to the next. The album has an undeniable influence of folk melodies, but seems to carry similarities to Power Metal as well. There is a heroic aura to the proceedings that gives the band an authentic approach. They perform melodramatic material that has emotional punch and hits straight to the heart.

The music here sometimes pulls on your heartstrings, but at others it just drags on. This is because the band shares a lot of similarities to the Power Metal genre, though they don’t entirely fit into it. That means the tunes to be found here are at times uplifting, while at others underwhelming. This can be seen from the track 'Afterworld' which is catchy and epic, but gets slightly mired down by a cheesy approach. The performances here are reasonably well done with vocals that have a theatric style and aren’t overly memorable, but somewhat efficient. All in all, there are moments that stick out, but also ones that drag and that makes the album fall a little short of what the band could achieve. There’s enough of a pleasing mindset to generate some attention, but not enough potency and overall impact to really make this an outstanding listen.

Fans of traditional and Power Metal might find something to like here if they don’t go expecting an absolute masterpiece. "Guardian Of Eternity" is regardless a good album that is definitely worth a listen or two. The band put together enough melodic material to provide an enjoyable, if unspectacular listen.

Categorical Rating Breakdown

Musicianship: 7
Atmosphere: 7
Production: 7.5
Originality: 6.5
Overall: 7

Rating: 7 out of 10

Review by Luka on May 13, 2001.

Whoa, with an album name like this and a totally indecipherable logo, these guys must be seriously evil!

Furious black-death metal from France that makes you wanna press ‘stop’ on your CD player rather than do what the title suggests. Blah, blah, blah, I’ve heard all the things the fanatics say about Antaeus and their kind, "complex, raw, totally Satanic and evil music the way it was meant to be". It may be that to some people but deep down it’s just a really really bad record done by a really really bad band. It seems complex because there’s pretty much no production done whatsoever. Everything is distorted and seems complicated simply because you can’t tell one riff from another and the drummer seems to follow no rhythm but does annoying blast beats and adds unnecessary drum fills every about three seconds.

The singer does the black metal rasp thing and once in a while adds a death growl just for good measure. Wow, all hail this master of the mike, he can do both! The lyrics aren’t printed because they probably suck as much as that new 12 year-old rapper’s. At least the kid’s on MTV and earns thousands.

Bottom Line: Brutal black-death metal release. Totally brutal and crushing. Brutal and merciless. The kind of brutal you use when something really sucks! Brutal, brutal, brutal, brutal!! HAHAHA!!! The word’s lost all it’s meaning, just like black metal...

Rating: 5 out of 10

Review by Krys on July 14, 2001.

Let me start by saying that Circle of Dead Children is not your typical grind band. Sure there are 17 tracks in 28:37 min., however “The Genocide Machine” is far from a generic gore-grind album. These guys have found almost a perfect mix of hardcore, grind, death or even doom without compromising the aggression and fury characteristic to this genre.

“The Genocide Machine” will challenge your ears and your mind. Uncharacteristically to most of the gore-grind bands, the lyrics are very well written and surprisingly thought provoking and absorbing. It’s well worth the time to sit down and read through them. Combined with very well thought musical background they create a sick and deranged atmosphere, which can satiate the most demanding fans. Jason Andrews’ guitar creates a wall of sound that can rip your soul and with help from rhythm section they’ll decapitate your body. Special attention should be paid to Joe Horvath’s vocals which, by seamlessly going from deep sickening guttural gurgle to high pitched screams, make you think there are at least two vocalists in this band. If not for a few tracks that are not more than just fillers this release would score the highest grade.

Highlights of the album are definitely opener ‘Migration’, ‘The Genocide Machine’, ‘Cremationism (Become the Flame)’, ‘Corpses Of Refinement (aka The Men Behind The Sun)’ and ‘Beethoven’s Children’ which stand for the ultimate expression of rage, anger and the band’s determination to become a leader in today’s extreme metal scene.

Bottom Line: “The Genocide Machine” represents the state of the art in brutal music and is an essential release in any metal music collector.

Ratting: 8.5 out of 10

Review by Adam M on February 11, 2012.

This album is one that has a very accessible flavour and lightened up by many keyboards and similar instruments. It moves along at a brisk pace that is similar to Children Of Bodom, for example. Throughout the length of the release, there is a great deal of excitement shown by the band, but the music is fairly mundane sounding to some extent, only catching your interest from time to time.

There isn’t anything particularly wrong with the musical performances, but they just don’t stick out in any manner whatsoever. Like Children Of Bodom, the music here is adequate and reasonably well structured, but not particularly interesting on the whole. It leads to a digestible, but forgettable listen overall. Similarly, the vocals are of the rough, high-pitched style that is similar to Children Of Bodom. They fit the music nicely, but aren’t anything noteworthy either. The best element of this album is probably the classical feel that it has, which does give it a slightly original feel, though it’s still quit derivate overall. The melodies are audible, but not really poignant either. This sense of melody is demonstrated on the early track 'Among The Stars.

Again, there’s nothing terrible with this release, but also nothing that makes a big impression either. "Corona Borealis" is a slightly below average album overall.

Categorical Rating Breakdown

Musicianship: 6
Atmosphere: 6.5
Production: 7
Originality: 5.5
Overall: 6.5

Rating: 6.3 out of 10

Review by Adam M on February 11, 2012.

This album is one that has a very accessible flavour and lightened up by many keyboards and similar instruments. It moves along at a brisk pace that is similar to Children Of Bodom, for example. Throughout the length of the release, there is a great deal of excitement shown by the band, but the music is fairly mundane sounding to some extent, only catching your interest from time to time.

There isn’t anything particularly wrong with the musical performances, but they just don’t stick out in any manner whatsoever. Like Children Of Bodom, the music here is adequate and reasonably well structured, but not particularly interesting on the whole. It leads to a digestible, but forgettable listen overall. Similarly, the vocals are of the rough, high-pitched style that is similar to Children Of Bodom. They fit the music nicely, but aren’t anything noteworthy either. The best element of this album is probably the classical feel that it has, which does give it a slightly original feel, though it’s still quit derivate overall. The melodies are audible, but not really poignant either. This sense of melody is demonstrated on the early track 'Among The Stars.

Again, there’s nothing terrible with this release, but also nothing that makes a big impression either. "Corona Borealis" is a slightly below average album overall.

Categorical Rating Breakdown

Musicianship: 6
Atmosphere: 6.5
Production: 7
Originality: 5.5
Overall: 6.5

Rating: 6.3 out of 10

Review by Adam M on February 11, 2012.

This album is one that has a very accessible flavour and lightened up by many keyboards and similar instruments. It moves along at a brisk pace that is similar to Children Of Bodom, for example. Throughout the length of the release, there is a great deal of excitement shown by the band, but the music is fairly mundane sounding to some extent, only catching your interest from time to time.

There isn’t anything particularly wrong with the musical performances, but they just don’t stick out in any manner whatsoever. Like Children Of Bodom, the music here is adequate and reasonably well structured, but not particularly interesting on the whole. It leads to a digestible, but forgettable listen overall. Similarly, the vocals are of the rough, high-pitched style that is similar to Children Of Bodom. They fit the music nicely, but aren’t anything noteworthy either. The best element of this album is probably the classical feel that it has, which does give it a slightly original feel, though it’s still quit derivate overall. The melodies are audible, but not really poignant either. This sense of melody is demonstrated on the early track 'Among The Stars.

Again, there’s nothing terrible with this release, but also nothing that makes a big impression either. "Corona Borealis" is a slightly below average album overall.

Categorical Rating Breakdown

Musicianship: 6
Atmosphere: 6.5
Production: 7
Originality: 5.5
Overall: 6.5

Rating: 6.3 out of 10

Review by Krys on July 22, 2001.

I guess it was just a question of time as to when the first HIM would clones invade the music industry; Entwine’s “Gone” answers that question and brings quite interesting version of love metal, gothic rock or however you want to call it. Although this album doesn’t bring anything new that wasn’t already done, all gothic fans should be more than happy with this release cause it has all best elements of this genre and it’s destined to make it big. It already stormed the homeland (Finland) charts.

As with most gothic rock releases, “Gone” doesn’t need many listening sessions to become addictive. Almost every track on this CD can become a hit single where poppy melodies, doomy guitar riffs and romantic lyrics create a very pleasant and relaxing atmosphere.

The true element that separates Entwine from their Finnish competition is new vocalist Mika Tauriainen and to tell you the truth I’m not sure if it’s for worse or for the better... Mike’s voice is much colder than Vile’s (HIM) which to some people can act as advantage. It doesn’t mean he just unemotionally sings the lyric lines but a larger voice range and deeper and warmer sound seem to me as a better fit to this type of music. What satisfies me the most is musical side of “Gone”, Entwine still knows for what guitars and drums were made and treat us with almost unstoppable array of very cool and at times even heavy riffs including double bass on ‘New Dawn’.

Therefore the aforementioned ‘New Down’, ‘Snow White Suicide’, ‘Thru the Darkness’ and more complex ‘Blood of Your Soul’ have to be my favorite tracks. If they could drop those exact sounding HIM-ish ballads like ‘Closer (My Love)’ or ‘Grace’ they could kick some serious gothic ass.

Bottom Line: First class gothic metal album and with the right promotion Entwine’s “Gone” can be their breakthrough release. Whoever holds this type of music as a favorite genre will surely not be disappointed.

Rating: 7 out of 10

Review by Adam M on February 11, 2012.

This album is one that has a very accessible flavour and lightened up by many keyboards and similar instruments. It moves along at a brisk pace that is similar to Children Of Bodom, for example. Throughout the length of the release, there is a great deal of excitement shown by the band, but the music is fairly mundane sounding to some extent, only catching your interest from time to time.

There isn’t anything particularly wrong with the musical performances, but they just don’t stick out in any manner whatsoever. Like Children Of Bodom, the music here is adequate and reasonably well structured, but not particularly interesting on the whole. It leads to a digestible, but forgettable listen overall. Similarly, the vocals are of the rough, high-pitched style that is similar to Children Of Bodom. They fit the music nicely, but aren’t anything noteworthy either. The best element of this album is probably the classical feel that it has, which does give it a slightly original feel, though it’s still quit derivate overall. The melodies are audible, but not really poignant either. This sense of melody is demonstrated on the early track 'Among The Stars.

Again, there’s nothing terrible with this release, but also nothing that makes a big impression either. "Corona Borealis" is a slightly below average album overall.

Categorical Rating Breakdown

Musicianship: 6
Atmosphere: 6.5
Production: 7
Originality: 5.5
Overall: 6.5

Rating: 6.3 out of 10

Review by Adam M on February 11, 2012.

This album is one that has a very accessible flavour and lightened up by many keyboards and similar instruments. It moves along at a brisk pace that is similar to Children Of Bodom, for example. Throughout the length of the release, there is a great deal of excitement shown by the band, but the music is fairly mundane sounding to some extent, only catching your interest from time to time.

There isn’t anything particularly wrong with the musical performances, but they just don’t stick out in any manner whatsoever. Like Children Of Bodom, the music here is adequate and reasonably well structured, but not particularly interesting on the whole. It leads to a digestible, but forgettable listen overall. Similarly, the vocals are of the rough, high-pitched style that is similar to Children Of Bodom. They fit the music nicely, but aren’t anything noteworthy either. The best element of this album is probably the classical feel that it has, which does give it a slightly original feel, though it’s still quit derivate overall. The melodies are audible, but not really poignant either. This sense of melody is demonstrated on the early track 'Among The Stars.

Again, there’s nothing terrible with this release, but also nothing that makes a big impression either. "Corona Borealis" is a slightly below average album overall.

Categorical Rating Breakdown

Musicianship: 6
Atmosphere: 6.5
Production: 7
Originality: 5.5
Overall: 6.5

Rating: 6.3 out of 10