Follow The Reaper

Follow the Reaper opens like a trapdoor beneath the listener: the title track erupts with serrated guitars, racing drums and keyboard lines that dart through the arrangement like sparks from a grinder. Children of Bodom had already established their identity, but here that identity becomes brighter, faster and more theatrical. The playing is outrageous, and for long stretches the album makes technical excess feel like a perfectly reasonable form of entertainment.

Follow the Reaper still flashes like a blade under stage lights, even when its brightest tricks begin to repeat themselves.

Bodom After Midnight and Children of Decadence push the formula hard. Alexi Laiho's guitar work is all flash and venom, yet the melodies remain clear enough to carry the songs. The keyboards do not merely decorate the riffs; they answer them, challenge them and occasionally steal the spotlight. That duel gives the album much of its character.

The high point is Everytime I Die, where the band slows just enough to let atmosphere into the room. The chorus has weight, the lead work serves the mood, and the song proves Children of Bodom could create drama without relying entirely on speed. Mask of Sanity and Hate Me return to the sprint, both built for impact and both difficult to resist in isolation.

The problem is accumulation. By the second half, the same rapid-fire transitions, neoclassical runs and clipped vocal phrases begin to feel less spontaneous. Northern Comfort and Kissing the Shadows are performed with ferocious precision, but their structural moves are already familiar by then. The album remains exciting, though not always surprising.

The bonus material adds volume rather than clarity, and the full running time slightly blunts the original sequence's attack. Still, Follow the Reaper has more personality than most records attempting this blend of melodic death metal and power-metal virtuosity. Its best moments are electric, immediate and built for the stage.

This is not Children of Bodom at their most balanced, but it may be them at their most dazzling. The record earns admiration through sheer force of character, even when its tricks begin circling familiar ground.