BLACKSUN embarked on its musical journey in 1999, steadily building its presence through a series of smaller releases. The band’s breakthrough came with the 2019 album Seed of Hate, which gained notable traction and expanded their reach in the music scene. Blacksun plays melodic heavy metal with powerful and epic elements mixing traditional guitar heavy parts with a modern sound and keyboards. Now in 2025 they are as relevant as ever with the well produced album release of Karma Somnium, with release date 10th of January 2025.
Line-up:
Manos Xanthakis – Vocals
Vassilis Veliopoulos – Guitars, Backing Vocals
Minas Papadopoulos – Guitars
Nick Koulelis – Bass
Thomas Chalanoulis – Drums
Aggelos Gerogiannis – Keys
Review
This album is a clean injection of heavy metal into the universe, with powerful, epic elements which are well produced, well written and with great emotion. Karma Somnium is the name of the first (instrumental) track, as well as the album. A grand piano sets the mood, sea waves rolling in, percussion, and a massive choir.
The first song of the album Last Chapter shows us all what Blacksun is really capable of. What strikes me first is a very clean and modern mix, with elements from 90’s heavy metal. The song writing is exceptional, not the classic E-D-C chords of NWOTHM – and in a good way! The production and vocals remind me of the album “The Chemical Wedding” by Bruce Dickinson (solo), and this whole album might turn out to be a great fit for those that are fans of Bruce Dickinson, and especially his solo career. The instrumental section is a great addition with luring keyboard and guitar melodies.
The first song had a keyboard solo and the second song Mirror is also keyboard-heavy, starting with a catchy melody as a keyboard intro. The totality of drums, guitar and bass is definitely on the heavier side. An epic verse and another catchy chorus in the style that reminds me of Bruce Dickinson give me what I crave for. This time the keyboard solo finishes off and follows up with some fast shredding on the guitar. This is another well written and catchy song.
Warrior’s Fate starts with a 2 minute intro, digging deep into the atmosphere of the album. I love it that these kinds of albums are meant to be listened to back-to-back, and not just a collection of songs distributed at random. This song also contains my favourite instrumental part of the album, with a pure twin guitar solo in the middle, cementing the sound in the NWOTHM style.
Tearing Me Apart shows great songwriting and chord progressions. Although this song is very heavy, and has some of the best chorus lines, I feel that it might miss something. I think that this particular song might have had more success as a “radio single” compressing the instrumental parts and focusing on a catchy chorus, because right now, this song is over 6 minutes, which might push it a little too far.
You Are Me is a great addition to the album as a grand piano ballad, containing some female vocal elements. This is not to understate the effort on the male vocal part, because it is some of the best sung vocals on the album, with great emotion. This would be a great song to watch as a live performance, and one of the more dynamic songs of the album especially when the distorted guitars and drums come in.
Forever Lost is the 7th song of the album, but should definitely not be missed. I think this song is the sum of talent in the band with a perfect mix of catchy guitar melodies, grand piano and in total a well written song with chord progressions that invite the listener for a closer experience. It is too bad that the lyrics in the chorus are very hard to make out, but the vocals are still an emotional element and sit perfectly in the mix.
Till The End is actually one of the more catchy songs, with a sound that really catches the Bruce Dickinson-style, but with less guitar and more keyboard. This one also feature guest vocals by Nikos Michalas, that are actually quite similar in style to the vocals by Manos. Since it is just over 4 minutes long with great hit potential, I am glad to find that this one is out on Youtube already.
The album ends with Light Remains in a similar short song-style clocking in at slightly less than 4 minutes. What I find here is another potential hit single with a catchy chorus, great instrumental parts, especially on the keyboard. The guitar parts in this song though, are the pure NWOTHM that I love so much.
Conclusion
This is heavy, well written metal with roots from the 90’s heavy metal scene such as Bruce Dickinson solo and the album also contains some modern elements with keyboard-heavy instrumental parts. This is a well produced metal album to be listened to back-to-back, but also containing some catchy songs and really captivating instrumental parts. The vocals are fantastically sung with great emotion, and to be compared to giants such as Bruce Dickinson.
Although what can unfortunately be said against the vocals is that the lyrics are not always that well heard. What I sometimes miss are the catchy phrases in the chorus where the words cut into the soul, and here sometimes the message is a bit unclear. Although the instrumental parts of the songs are very good and contribute to great emotion, especially listening to the album back-to-back, I feel that some songs could have better hit potential if they were shorter.
TheNwothm Score: 8/10
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https://blacksun21.bandcamp.com
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