What do you do if you've released a nearly perfect album in the past? Of course, try making a new one that's even better. That's exactly what the guys from Noumena did with their new record "Anatomy Of Life". Last year's "Absence" could already be considered a brilliant album, but believe me, it is possible to top this album. The highly anticipated "Anatomy Of Life" ties perfectly up to the predecessor and even adds new elements. What I've always liked best about Noumena's style was the mixture of melancholic and yet very catchy melodies, heavy riffs and the combination of harsh and clean vocals. Of course the melodies play the biggest role in their music again but they managed to create a dark atmosphere in every song. It is also nice to hear Tuomas Tuominen (Fall Of The Leafe) and Hanna Leinonen again on this album as guest vocalists. The vocal mixture - death grunts vs. clean vocals - always adds a lot of contrasts but also feelings to the songs. I think this can be heard very well in the opener "Misanthropolis" or "Triumph and Loss", a hit song with an awesome chorus and also my favorite song of this album. With this song Noumena show that they have all qualities to give a great song what it needs and I could listen to it nonstop :). Like "Absence", "Anatomy Of Life" also features a song with Hanna Leinonen on lead vocals. "Through The Element" reminds me of "The Great Anonymous Doom" as it's also one of the slower, gloomier songs on the album but can convince with its guitar harmonies.
However, the most striking element of this album are still the melodies. Even though, compared to "Absence", I would say that the focus lies more on the individual song structure than on the melodies. The whole album sounds more mature and the band worked on their songwriting qualities.
Still it would be boring if I called this album 'perfect' thus I can only say that it's a step forward from their last release and that they are on the right way now. I'm curious about the next effort of this band now. And if we should pick up the good old "make it or break it"- story of whether the third album of a band decides its future then Noumena never had to worry about this anyway. For me "Anatomy Of Life" is already one of the highlights of this year.

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