NIGHTWISH — Endless Forms Most Beautiful (review)

NIGHTWISH — Endless Forms Most Beautiful album cover

Album · 2015 · Symphonic Metal

4/5 · 2015-04-14
adg211288

Endless Forms Most Beautiful (2015) is the eighth full-length studio album by Finnish symphonic metal act Nightwish. For this album the band has increased their line-up to six having added Troy Donockley (who was a guest on their last two albums) to their line-up full time playing uilleann pipes, low whistle, bodhran and bouzouki. With that said drummer Jukka Nevalainen opted out of taking part in Endless Forms Most Beautiful due to his suffering with insomnia, so the drums on the album ended up being performed on a session basis by Kai Hahto (Wintersun, Swallow the Sun). The album also marks the first studio album with lead vocalist Floor Jansen (ReVamp, ex-After Forever) following Anette Olzon's dismissal. Both Jansen and Donockley appear on the prior live album/DVD Showtime, Storytime (2013) so Endless Forms Most Beautiful isn't really their introduction to the fans, though they were both still guests when the live album was recorded.

I had high hopes for this album as soon as I knew that Floor Jansen had been selected as the new vocalist of Nightwish. After original vocalist Tarja Turunen was fired Jansen was my personal choice to replace her. Instead we got Anette Olzon, who lets be fair on both sides of the argument, wasn't the sort of singer anyone was expecting or really wanted considering Tarja's operatic style that so defined the Nightwish sound, but who also didn't really do that bad of a job on the two albums she got to do with the band. Though I did not like it at all at first I happen to really quite enjoy Imaginaerum (2011) now and consider it Nightwish's bravest and most adventurous record. But with all that said, Floor Jansen would always have been a better replacement for Tarja Turunen. So this is really a better late than never appointment if you ask me.

It's a real shame though that Floor's talents feel completely downplayed and squandered on Endless Forms Most Beautiful. Floor Jansen is an incredible vocalist. She can do the operatic stuff like Tarja, but also be quite comfortable doing the stuff Anette sang on. She can also do growls, as demonstrated on her most recent ReVamp album Wild Card (2013). Not that I ever expected growls to make their way into Endless Forms Most Beautiful, though there are bits during Yours is an Empty Hope that sound like she's trying hard to hold herself back from doing just that. Wasn't what I was getting at anyway. It simply seems to me that Nightwish didn't make full use of Floor's abilities as a vocalist on the album and that's a lot of thrown away potential before the actual music is even discussed. Now don't get the wrong end of the stick with me here, Floor does sound great, but I have listened to her in other bands and I believe she has done better performances and perhaps more to the point, performances that have long had me convinced that she, not Anette Olzon, was the singer to replace Tarja Turunen.

The situation with the vocals extends to male vocalist Marco Hietala as well though, as he has had his vocal contributions incredibly scaled back on this album, to just three songs, not counting backing. While male vocals haven't always played a role in Nightwish's music, Marco has had quite a strong presence since Century Child (2002) and it feels strange for him to suddenly be pushed to the side. I can't even reason that it's because the band want to show Floor off, because as I said, she can do a lot more with her range and power than she does here. Troy Donockley gets a little bit of vocal time too, but not enough to balance things out.

Endless Forms Most Beautiful sets a better first impression than Imaginaerum did for me, as I actually really hated that album at first but it seems to be a thing with me now that Nightwish records need three or four listens to properly sink in. Endless Forms Most Beautiful has grown on me a lot quicker than the previous album though, but I'm actually not sure that's a positive thing for once, as I'm left with the nagging feeling that my opinion on the record, which I do enjoy despite my incessant moaning about it, has already settled down, leaving no room down the track to say, as happened with Imaginaerum, "You know what? This is a lot better than I originally gave it credit for!"

I've said that I eventually came to consider Imaginaerum as Nightwish's bravest and most adventurous record; the band even experimented by putting a jazz track on it, but by comparison the music found on Endless Forms Most Beautiful plays things very safe with the band's influences. They're brought the power metal elements back, not enough to call Endless Forms Most Beautiful a power metal record like Oceanborn (1998) or Wishmaster (2000), but enough to make them notable, which is a positive thing to me. They've also again increased their folk elements, giving the album a very Celtic feeling. Again, I consider this a positive thing. But there are no surprises in store for listeners either. It sounds more or less how you might have expected a Nightwish album to sound pre-Imaginaerum. That in itself is not necessarily a bad thing but it does seem to me that Imaginaerum, the harder record to really understand and appreciate, is ultimately more rewarding.

This is probably due to that whole wasted potential thing I mentioned when I was talking about Floor's vocals, though the problems on Endless Forms Most Beautiful certainly extend beyond that. This is a good album by Nightwish overall but it's clear to me that it could have been a lot better had they made some different stylistic decisions. Most of the songs are actually really quite good, especially My Walden, Alpenglow and the lead single Élan. The only track I don't have a high opinion of is the instrumental The Eyes of Sharbat Gula, which at six minutes really outstays its welcome for the amount of ideas present. I'm also got mixed feelings for the closing twenty-four minute epic, The Greatest Show on Earth. On one hand, some of the very best ideas on the album are contained within this track but like with The Eyes of Sharbat Gula it simply feels a bit too long, at least in some sections, and probably could safely have been cut down by quite a few minutes. I'm not big on the narration (done by ethologist/evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins) either, though it's not as bad as was done with Imaginaerum's Song of Myself and it's poem recital. But tracks one through nine are pretty strong.

Endless Forms Most Beautiful is a difficult album to rate because while it is good it also has some glaring faults, ones that were apparent from the first spin and didn't disappear as the album grew on me. I have moments when I think that even despite my issues with it I should award as high as a 4.5 star rating and then others when I think it should be as low as 3 stars. I'm going to settle on 4 stars but objectively speaking, the rating is only just scraping up from a 3.5.

more than 2 years ago
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adg211288 wrote:

more than 2 years ago

I think the record is 82.

Unitron wrote:

more than 2 years ago

Wow, this is the largest amount of comments I've seen on a review. Have their been more then this?

powermetal2000 wrote:

more than 2 years ago

No, that's a pretty useless 'solution' and a terrible idea. Steam's system gives games an approval percentage based on the number of positives verses the number of negatives.

Let's picture two albums. Both get five reviews each. The first album's reviews are all 3 stars/60%, which is still a positive score. On Steam's system that would still give it 100% approval rating. Album 2 gets four 5 star/100% reviews but also a 1 star/20%. Suddenly album 2 doesn't have a 100% approval rating even though it still has four 5 star positive reviews because it has one negative. Average score should be 3 stars for album 1 and 4.2 stars for album 2, but under Steam's system, album 1 would now rank higher.

bartosso wrote:

more than 2 years ago

yeah, I used to think so, I do not anymore. You could have those lists with a simple, binary system too, like the one you have on Steam, for instance. You either recommend an album or not + review. Perfect, elegant solution. That is all I have to say.

powermetal2000 wrote:

more than 2 years ago

Ratings are far from useless. They serve as a quick summary regarding the tone a review will take (I am more likely to read a positive review than a negative one in most cases, for example). Collectively they also allow, on sites like this, lists to be formed showing the highest rated stuff. Without ratings those lists you see on every genre page would not be able to exist. I find your logic very flawed.

I agree that what a reviewer writes is more important than whatever score they decided to attach to it but to say ratings are useless is a bit much. I do feel that ratings should fully correspond to the text though. This for example is a well written review but to me, it read like a 3.5 at maximum (and more like a 3). But he gave it 4 stars.

bartosso wrote:

more than 2 years ago

@powermetal2000: Truth is if you understood how it really worked, you'd know ratings are useless. An objective system doesn't exist because we're not rating hotels here, we're rating music. Review is all that matters and numeral/star ratings should be removed entirely so we can avoid pointless discussions like this one.

powermetal2000 wrote:

more than 2 years ago

Maybe, but I do think score is important too. But to me score loses value if you're consistently rating at higher marks. If a reviewer I follow rates more in the 3 - 3.5 line most often I take notice more when I see higher marks and end up reading reviews I might otherwise have ignored.

adg211288 wrote:

more than 2 years ago

I agree that there are merits to your system, but I'll be sticking with what I know, thanks all the same.

I'll also add here what I always say when someone criticizes my system; review text is much more important than the score attached to it.

powermetal2000 wrote:

more than 2 years ago

Much like adg211288 disagrees with my system, I too find his mathematical system flawed. In maths, you always round up if you're at 5 or higher. That means you're always doing a little bit more rounding up than you are rounding down. You end up with more higher ratings that way which to me, is not a good thing. If you're rounding up and giving out lots of 4 stars or higher for near misses as adg211288 has done with this Nightwish album, how is anyone supposed to know when you really actually love something? Considering how much he ragged on this album, I find a 4 star rating very confusing.

powermetal2000 wrote:

more than 2 years ago

Not really. If 4 stars is 80% then 79% is only 'nearly' 4 stars, so it's 3.5.

666sharon666 wrote:

more than 2 years ago

So you'd rather take away 9% than add 1%? That seems a bit harsh.

powermetal2000 wrote:

more than 2 years ago

Always round down man. Always round down.

adg211288 wrote:

more than 2 years ago

I've seen others use the same system you do powermetal2000 and I'll give you the main reason I disagree with it, using that system 79% also equals 3.5 stars and I see no reason to use a 3.5 when something is only 1% off of a straight 80%/4 stars. Mathematical rounding is completely logical to me. But again, each to their own. I'm not going to tell you how or how not to rate. I'd appreciate the courtesy.

adg211288 wrote:

more than 2 years ago

Well you're free to rate using whatever system you like, but mine is grounded in basic maths.

powermetal2000 wrote:

more than 2 years ago

Because it's in the 70% range, not the 80% range.

adg211288 wrote:

more than 2 years ago

Really. Well I'd like to know how you worked that one out. 75%/4 stars seems pretty logical to me.

powermetal2000 wrote:

more than 2 years ago

If it is 75% then this should be 3.5 stars at the very most.

adg211288 wrote:

more than 2 years ago

In reality, this rating is about 75%, so as I said, scraping 4 stars. But I dropped using percentages this year.

Simple fact of the matter for me is, if Floor used all of her abilities on the album it would be an easy 4.5. If the last two tracks were on the same level as the rest of the album it may have even been the full 5 stars. The biggest issue with the album for me is the wasted potential, not that the end result itself is bad because I don't think it is. But you know, one man's junk and all that...

666sharon666 wrote:

more than 2 years ago

"If you think it should only be 3 stars sometimes then that is the rating you should have given it."

Not necessarily. He also said he had times where he thought it should be a 4.5. He could just have easily have rounded up. 4 stars is fair considering what he wrote, which weighs up quite a few positives and negatives.

I'd rate it about the same.

Bosh66 wrote:

more than 2 years ago

Meh, easy feedback. Put forward a counter argument by submitting a review yourself powermetal2000 ;-)

The truth is you're both likely to be right. While there is good and bad music, there's also a huge blurry bit in the middle where I'll see merit in something you despise, and vice-versa.

powermetal2000 wrote:

more than 2 years ago

Meh. 4 stars is WAY too generous for this. If you think it should only be 3 stars sometimes then that is the rating you should have given it. Always round down! Even 3 stars is 1 star too man...