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Antagonise (2014) is the second full-length album by Dutch progressive symphonic death metal act MaYaN. Since the release of Quarterpast (2011) the band has extended their line-up, now including three lead vocalists centred around different voice types; Mark Jansen (growls), Henning Basse (clean) and Laura Macrì (soprano). While all three featured on the debut, only Jansen, the band's founder, was a full member at the time. The album additionally features guest vocals from Floor Jansen (ReVamp, Nightwish) and Marcela Bovio (Stream of Passion), so it's almost the same vocalists featured on Quarterpast except instead of Bovio the debut album had Simone Simons (Epica). Guitarist Isaac Delahaye is at this point no longer fully affiliated with the group although he has a guest contribution, with the bulk of guitars on Antagonise played by Frank Schiphorst. Delahaye was replaced after recording by Merel Bechtold (Purest of Pain). Antagonise additionally marks the recording debut of bassist Rob van der Loo, who had joined before the release of Quarterpast but did not play on it.
Quarterpast came with a genre branding as a subtitle of sorts: "Symphonic Death Metal Opera". Although there should always have been a "progressive" in there to accurately describe MaYaN's music, it was more or less accurate. The music was symphonic death metal, and because of the presence of Laura Macrì it did also have a small amount of genuine opera. Had Macrì been given more singing time, the branding, progressive not being in it aside, would have been 100% accurate to describe what MaYaN sounded like. Quarterpast was an absolutely killer debut album all the same; a more extreme side of Mark Jansen's (and several other members of MaYaN) other band Epica, who as I'm sure anyone who knows their symphonic metal will tell you, are on the heavier side of the genre to begin with.
With Laura Macrì and her soprano voice promoted to full-time member status within the band it is perhaps the logical conclusion that Antagonise would further seize on the "opera" part of Quarterpast's branding despite not carrying that or any sort of genre branding at all this time around, and be the album that Quarterpast described on the tin.
Well if you did come to that conclusion, as I did, then you'd be wrong. I think that Laura Macrì gets a bit more singing time on Antagonise compared to Quarterpast, however now that she's considered a full member I did expect to hear more of her this time. Not more than Mark Jansen of course, this is still meant to be a death metal album despite the numerous other trappings that surround that core sound, which include some power metal in a few tracks, but definitely more than Henning Basse, who by contrast sounds firmly established as the lead clean singer. He sounds excellent; definitely the best performance I've heard from him, but I can't help but feel that for a band who so brazenly put symphonic death metal opera on their previous cover art that if that's what they really want to be, then we need to start hearing less Basse and more Macrì with Jansen's growls still taking the central role.
Of course, I don't claim to know the minds of the musicians in MaYaN, and they didn't repeat that branding on the cover of Antagonise, so for all I know symphonic death metal opera isn't something they're even interested in achieving at this point. But they have shown on both albums that they can achieve a sound that is very easily described as such, such as Antagonise's Human Sacrifice. The female vocals in this song are actually shared with Marcela Bovio, but she provides a similar effect to Laura. The first female voice is Marcela, the second is Laura. It's a very cool sound, with the female vocals only coming in after a more traditionally death metal orientated couple of minutes and there's still room made later on for a contribution from Henning. It's definitely disappointing that MaYaN appear to have taken all the correct steps to further explore it, and then don't. It is equally disappointing that they add a talented singer like Laura Macrì to their line-up and then don't give her the opportunity to shine.
This isn't to say that the quality of Antagonise is adversely affected in any way by sticking with safe and familiar ground, the music itself is still the same high quality work that I have come to expect from a Mark Jansen album, be it with MaYaN or Epica, and if I'm honest it even has one up on Quarterpast if we're discussing the actual composition. There's a slightly more intense edge to some of the riffs this time that further lend weight to MaYaN's status as a death metal act, but there's still a lot of polish to their sound, particularly when it's Henning singing and naturally when he takes over from Mark Jansen the album doesn't sound anything like death metal, but overall Mark is still the lead voice so although the album may entirely leave the genre at intervals, it always comes back around to a death metal sound. The symphonic elements sound great and the progressive flairs within the instrumental work never fail to offer up some interesting touches to the riffs. A couple of tracks haven't sunk in so well as most of the album though, particularly Enemies of Freedom which features voice-overs questioning whether guns are good or bad depending on the situation they're used in, which I feel distracts from and thus detracts from the excellent music.
There is a lot more top quality music here than not though and songs like Enemies of Freedom are only slightly lesser than their betters. I've already mentioned Human Sacrifice as a track where MaYaN really does manage a symphonic death metal opera sound so that is an obvious highlight of the release. You also have Burn Your Witches, which is perhaps best described as symphonic power-death the way the riffs flit back and forth in style depending on whether it's Mark or Henning's turn to sing. It also has Floor Jansen show up towards the end. The longest track, Faceless Spies, which was the first that MaYaN released to the public, is also an instant highlight for its epic quality, which also includes a lengthy violin solo by Greek musician Dimitris Katsoulis.
While MaYaN certainly have potential for a sound they've still only scratched the surface of, what they do within the still relatively small symphonic death metal genre is a lot more adventurous than just about every other band I've heard playing the style, although it's that adventurous nature that could ironically see them alienated as a death metal act; there are a lot of clean vocals by Henning Basse and the music itself can diverge into other metal styles for an extended period of time. To my ears this is still a death metal album however, because you shouldn't really expect an album that is also progressive to bother with the rulebook. Although they may not have done much different between albums, this is what makes Antagonise a case where more of the same is perfectly acceptable.
I've had to give Antagonise many spins to settle on a final opinion, more than I need for most albums. Disappointment over an apparent lack of growth between albums, surrounding Laura Macrì's contributions for the most part, did have me holding back on my initial impressions but at the end of the day quality of songwriting wins through, and one shouldn't let unmet preconceptions get in the way of appreciating what an album actually sounds like. The songs from Quarterpast are all still as excellent as they were in 2011, but on Antagonise MaYaN have honed the sound of that album, even if it's just by a small amount. Yes, there is some untapped potential here that I'd still like to hear explored in the future, but I'm confident that, having allowed time for it to sink in, like Quarterpast before it, Antagonise is a 5 star album from MaYaN.