Released: Nov 11, 2008
Label: Sumerian Records
Number Of Tracks: 9
The guitars on The Faceless's new album, tone wise are very nice. The drum mix is a little loud at times, and it blocks out the guitars but you can still hear them most of the time and solo's are always nice and clear.
Planetary Duality
Reviewed by:
guitar_jew, on september 08, 2009 2 of 2 people found this review helpful
Sound: Planetary Duality. The title implies science fiction, which is relatively prevalent throughout the album, with song titles such as 'XenoChrist' and 'Shape Shifters.'
The album opens with the short, hard hitting Prison Born, with its blisteringly fast fills and stop-rhythm chorus. Michael Keene's guitar performance throughout the record is extremely well-constructed, with some of the best melody lines you've ever heard on a death metal album, such as in 'Coldly Calculated Design' and 'The Ancient Covenant.' The medley that is the title track is an extremely effective dose of ambience in the first movement, and unforgiving death metal in the second.
Lyle Cooper's drumming is just outright fantastic, if only for the fact that the drumming fits in with the music, even among the complex time signature changes. The bass is barely noticeable, except for the tapping fill that opens 'The Ancient Covenant.' // 10
Lyrics and Singing: The lyrics are typical death metal fare, but the way in which they are presented are what really prevent the album from ever becoming monotonous. You've got the standard growling and shrieking for most of the album, but amidst this, there are sections where the vocals take on a 'robot' sound, and even some bits where Keene takes on some clean singing, which lends to the songs extremely effectively, without sounding horribly out of place, except for one instance in 'Sons of Belial,' which isn't, by any means, a bad song.
The clean vocals are an extremely welcome change from typical death metal, especially in that they don't sound like something you'd find on a Killswitch Engage record. // 8
Impression: Several fans have complained that the album is too short. But that's th beauty of it. You can listen to the whole thing without getting bored, or being unable to differentiate between two songs. Because Planetary Duality is so short, it saves itself from the monotony that plagues even the best of death metal records.
All in all, it's an excellent album. I definitely recommend it to anyone who appreciates a good death metal band, but isn't closed-minded to some unusual aspects of the music. // 9
Planetary Duality
Reviewed by:
d3cr3p1tb1rth, on november 25, 2011 0 of 0 people found this review helpful
Sound: The sound of The Faceless's 2nd studio album is beyond imaginable, it is so good, the guitars are legit, drumming is awesome, and you can never forget the vox of the faceless no doubt about that for sure, the style in this album is Technical Death Metal, which is a sub genre of Death metal, I would give props mostly too xenochrist and planetary duality part one and two, I'm saying the whole album is pretty amazing but I would think these would be my 2 favorite out of the whole album.
"A virgin womb defiled with the slithering parasitic seed of the Xenochrist", this lyric speaks to me for sure, this lyric is from "Xenochrist".
Props to The Faceless for making this amazing album, thank you very much... The Faceless has clear sound, including vox, guitar, synthesizers, drums, bass. They have a very unique sound in the technical death metal sub-genre. // 10
Lyrics and Singing: The lyrics are just not imaginable, and when you listen to the deep vox of Derek "Demon Carcass" Rydquist which was the old singer of The Faceless (2006-2011). Skills are pretty amazing, I give him props for every song he has sung, amazing vox I say! The vox go so good with the bands sound it fits in so perfectly, it is unbelievable. // 10
Impression: Well personally I can see the difference from "Akeldama", but I like "Planetary Duality" and "Akeldama" the same in my opinion. I can't compare, I think each band has its own sound and quality, so I cannot compare The Faceless from any other death metal band. In my opinion I would pick "Coldly Calculated Design", "Xenochrist", and "Planetary Duality Part 1" and "2".
If the record got stolen that I have boughten, first sh-tkick them to the curb, then take it back, if I can't take it back then I will buy a new one no problem, oh hell if I lost/broken/got stolen this album, I would just buy a new one I don't care I love this band. // 10
Planetary Duality
Reviewed by:
deathmetalmann, on november 12, 2008 1 of 2 people found this review helpful
Sound: The guitars on The Faceless's new album, tone wise are very nice. The drum mix is a little loud at times, and it blocks out the guitars but you can still hear them most of the time and solo's are always nice and clear. They still hold on to thier Technical Death Metal label with intense runs, blazing speed, and some very nice riffs that grab you and don't let go. I heard more Black Metal influence guitar, drum, and ambience wise later in the album. Drums on this album, are as on the last album; impressive. Super fast double bass, with some creative fills. Like mentioned before, it seems in some songs that the drums and snare are a little too loud.
Vocal wise, the volume at times was a hair quiet, screaming was still very good. The robotic vocals, sounded a bit nasaly somehow. I prefer the Demo version of "The Ancient Covenant" robotic vocals. Overall sound production, at times I think there was too much production put into this album. // 9
Lyrics and Singing: I enjoyed the story to this album. Good use of language, they didn't throw in too many, what can be percieved to be "big words". The lyrics did a good job of painting the picture I think the band wanted people to see. In compliance with the music, everything fit together pretty well. The man's speaking introduction ("Planetary Duality" Part 1) was a good buildup to the 2nd part. Screaming skills, nothing different from "Akeldama". Nice layering in some areas. Singing wise, I didn't feel that some of the singing parts fit the album at times. Especially in "Sons of Belial" it just didn't sound like it fit in this genre of music. I appreciate the need for change although. // 9
Impression: This album is too short! It lifts you up quickly and then lets you down as quickly as it brought you up! There are some very very nice moments on this album. The most impressive songs I would have to say are "The Ancient Covenant", the short "Prison Born" and "Legion of the Serpent". I like the slight Black Metal influence in some songs and the piano part in "Legion of the Serpent". Like mentioned before, I dislike the drum volume and the slight overproduced sound. But, other than that, the ambience, mood, tone, and everything else is very well structured and stands out well. As short as it is, I would buy it again if something were to happen to my copy. // 8
Yeah the vocalist sounds like Psycroptic sometimes but even tho they both have similar styles of playing guitar I don't think they're the same as Psycroptic.
Reminds me a little TOO much of Psycroptic at times though...
That kinda bugged me.
I'm not one for Psycroptic.
I listened through again, and I think this album is almost an ode to all Tech-death bands.
I hear lots of Cynic, Arsis, Quo Vadis, Gorguts (I can't comprehend the riffing patterns at times), Anata, Necrophagist, Meshuggah, Spawn of Possession, Beneath the Massacre, Decapitated, and the like.
But it's undeniably The Faceless.
the insanely sinister catch of the way "sons of belial" flows makes this one of my all time favorite metal albums. i have loved this band since i first heard pestilence and cant wait to see them in tampa.
I still think "Akeldama" was a better album, but I mean don't get me wrong "Planetary Duality" was a good album but as I stated earlier "Akledama" all the way
Amazing, solid album. Brutal and melodic at times. The atmosphere is really intense througout the whole album. Freakin love the guitars in Legions of the Serpent.
Too short but hella amzing....but if a band is going to add clean vocals then add more than 20 seconds worth, the vocoder is cool in the likeness of cynic. Amzing and brilliant and the lyrics a intelligent.
those weren't power metal vocals guy above me. Power metal vocalists usually use a higher pitch and sound a little bit like women. The guy didn't sound like a woman but the singing didn't really fit
Sound's Like 'Colors' from Between The Buried in Me.
I'm new to these guys and I got turned on to them by their bassist ...still trying to get his licks down
I really don't like the vocorder parts, but the rest if F--KING AWESOME!!!
For your information, it's "vocoder". Get your facts straight before you call people "****ing retarded". I deleted your spam post, next time it's a warning.
Goddamn I hate the drums on this album. I haven't listenened to it for a while because of the goddamn snare - to me it's like it's all over the place, which I think is pretty annoying. But I might have to listen to it again ^^
Why the hell does everyone like Xenochrist so much though? its the most boring, repetative song on the album, especially when it gets to the end. Not to say its a bad song but far from the best on the album. Legion of the Serpent, Sons of Belial and Planetary Duality II kill it.[quote]test1cles wrote:
Goddamn I hate the drums on this album. I haven't listenened to it for a while because of the goddamn snare -
I think the snare sounds awesome. The problem is the drums are a bit too high in the mix.
Amazing album, love these guys. Drums are a bit loud, and the vocals arent loud enough. It dosent kill the album by any means though. I myself liked the vocoder parts, they lended to the overall creepy alien vibe of things. This also probably takes the cake on album art, cause its amazing. 9.5
the insanely sinister catch of the way "sons of belial" flows makes this one of my all time favorite metal albums. i have loved this band since i first heard pestilence
When I first bought it, Sons Of Belial was my least favorite to listen to, but after I learned how to play it, that was my favorite song to play on the album. I too have been in love since I first heard Pestilence =)
I listen to this on a daily basis. I'm not a huge fan of death or tech death, but this album blows my freaking mind. Looking forward to more albums from these guys.
We've detected that you are using Ad Blocking software.
If you hate ads, but love Ultimate Guitar, how about subscribing to Ultimate Guitar's Ad Free Service? If you subscribe to this service, you won't see annoying banner ads, pop-up ads, text-link ads or video ads and will be helping to support your favorite site at the same time.
As you know, we provide you with a lot of great, free content like news, reviews, interviews, tabs and chords, but you see, ads are the way we generate revenue to run UG and pay royalties to the songwriters and music publishers of the songs that are posted here.
Was this review helpful to you? 
Still not fully grown onto me yet, but then I think about how damn long "Akeldama" took before I absolutely loved it!
"XenoChrist" is my favourite song.