adg211288 From Refuge to Ruin is the third album by US power-thrash metal act Dark Empire. The 2012 album is their first release since 2008’s Humanity Dethroned and with the exception of guitarist and harsh vocalist Matt Moliti it features a completely new line-up. Brian Larkin takes over lead vocal duties from Jens Carlsson (actually he technically replaces Urban Breed but Breed had a very short stint in the band and never recorded with them) and Randy Knecht joins on bass. The other instruments are handled by guest musicians.

The above is all just matter of fact history of the band. Personally this is my first experience with Dark Empire, so I can’t say how From Refuge to Ruin compares to the aforementioned Humanity Dethroned or the group’s 2006 debut Distant Tides. All I know is that coming to this album as a complete newbie I’m being treated to some really strong progressively inclined power and thrash metal hybrid that also draws on death metal through the use of growling vocals and perhaps more surprisingly, some folk influence. There are a lot of different things going into the Dark Empire formula in other words, and it works very well for them.

The main style here is power metal though. Thrash comes in a lot of places but it’s rare that a track feels thrash dominant. The progressive influences are sometimes very subtle but also sometimes very prominent, such as in the title track, which features the use of a flute. The death metal aspect mostly comes through the use of growled vocals, which are nowhere near as commonly used as Brian Larkin’s clean vocals. The balance between all their influences is consistently good, allowing Dark Empire to craft tracks that are driven by strong power/thrash metal riffs, good choruses that maintain power metal’s hooks, as well as some extreme metal aggression as needed to give the already heavy music even more bite. They’re very capable at crafting an epic as well, such as the title track again but also the closing fourteen minute piece The Cleansing Fires. So to cut a long story short this is in no way a typical power metal album, yet it still does have all the elements needed for a typical power metal album. That’s quite the achievement really.

That is really what sets Dark Empire’s sound above that of the majority. I wouldn’t personally call From Refuge to Ruin any kind of a masterpiece but the sound and musical direction of the band requires nothing but praise. It’s hard not to notice that the metal community as a whole can have something of a level of distain for power metal, considering it cheesy for the most part. What Dark Empire does essentially is throw the cheese out in favour of the extremity that thrash and death metal bring resulting in a power metal sound with added intensity. Personally I think adding growls to power metal (or traditional metal) will backfire more often than not but Dark Empire makes it work. Actually they make it work so well that you’d think that the growling was a staple of the genre. It’s because of all this that I think From Refuge to Ruin is a power metal album that will not only appeal to power metal fans, but also to those who don’t have a high regard for the style. A great album for the all round metalhead for sure.

As I said earlier in this review I’m new to Dark Empire, but honestly I can’t see anyone who knows their stuff about metal not finding something to like here. From Refuge to Ruin is a great album (pushing towards exceptional) and I for one think it rocks hard.

8.3/10

(Originally written for Heavy Metal Haven (http://metaltube.freeforums.org))

Time Signature What men call metal...

Genre: power-thrash

I've always thought that there should be "power" in power metal, and one of the reasons that I am very critical of the genre (which I otherwise love very much) is that a lot of power metal tends to be cheesy and even goofy in a sort of happy puppy way. The American power metallers in Dark Empire's music is free of power metal cheese, and full of "power" all the way through.

Stylistically, I would say that we are dealing with power-thrash than pure power metal, which is underlined already in the opening track 'A Plague in the Throne Room', which might even be described as more thrash than power metal. Dark Empire not only make use of elements from thrash metal; like Cage and Iron Fire, Dark Empire also incorporate elements from extreme metal into their style, and this is one feature that I welcome. Thus, Dark Empire make use of additional growled vocals, provided by guitarist Matt Moliti, which go well together with main vocalist Brian Larkin's more traditional US power metal vocals. Larkin has a powerful and a kind of raw voice which suits the style of "From Ruin to Refuge" very well.

Dark Empire call their own style 'dark power metal' and that is a quite fitting label, because, although there are thrash, melodeath, and other extreme-metal elements aplenty, the core sound is undeniably power metal, and the genre-defining features are there, such as the grandiose and epic catchy choruses, and an overall epic atmosphere that actually goes well with the album's more aggressive sides. As with Symphony X's brand of power metal, there is progressive twist on "From Refuge to Ruin" in the form of some odd time signatures, the use of some alternative song structures, and some neoclassicisms. However, Dark Empire's style is much more aggressive and less progressive than Symphony X, so do not expect a "Paradise Lost" or an "Iconoclast".

"From Refuge to Ruin" is definitely a great power-thrash album that is rich in dark atmosphere and aggression, yet contains all the elements that make good power metal.