小简介
年轻人总是能创造许多的惊喜！如德国的 Edguy、义大利的Empty Tremor，都是以约莫20岁的平均年龄，就在金属乐界绽放光芒的年轻新星。而来自荷兰的After Forever，又是一支以20岁年龄扬名于金属界的「20岁俱乐部」会员，但更难能可贵的是，他们已接连发表了两张极具艺术水准的优质作品！组成于 1995年的After Forever，在声乐女高音主唱Floor Jansen于97年加入乐团之后，正式迈向创作之路。这支年轻乐团于99年以平均年龄仅19岁之姿，便以一张demo获到Transmission Records的赏识而得到一纸唱片合约，After Forever也不负众望地于2000年发表了叫好又叫座的首张专辑，专辑的广受好评，让乐团的名气快速打开。然而企图心旺盛的After Forever并没有停下前进的脚步，在唱片公司的全力支援下，得到许多金属乐团梦昧以求与交响乐团及唱诗班合作演出的机会，并于2001年末发表了更加令人震憾的第二张专辑！由于它的开创性和令人深深着迷的编曲，也打败众多优质的金属作品，而成为笔者心目中2001年度最佳金属专辑的首选。我之所以会如此欣赏After Forever的原因，就在于其动人的创作力！由于团员们对于各类型金属音乐以及古典乐的广泛吸收，使其音乐风格呈现出了广阔的包容性，在gothic death metal的基调上，注入了多样音乐派别的精华，如doom metal、black metal、progressive metal、古典乐、声乐.. .等等，将前卫金属的概念式与丰富多变的编曲思维，发挥于歌德金属当中，加上浓郁的交响味，和女主唱动人的演唱表现，构筑出高质感的歌德金属乐。在 After Forever的作品中，让人看到了宽阔的视野和丰沛的创造力，也看到了歌德金属发展的弹性与多元性，事实上个人认为在各式金属派别当中，歌德金属的发展可能性可说是非常之高的，面对前卫金属始终难以跳脱既有框架的景象，相反地，After Forever展现出的丰富音乐性，反倒更能让人感受到「创新」的活力！除了音乐之外，女主唱Floor的演唱亦是一大重点，Floor的音色与唱腔可说综合了同乡乐团The Gathering主唱Anneke van Giersbergen和Within Temptation主唱Sharon den Adel的飘渺美声，以及Nightwish主唱Tarja的声乐腔，其在演唱表现上能配合着曲式流畅地游走于一般腔与声乐腔之间。
Originating in Holland, After Forever represent a distinctly new-millennium breed of heavy metal band -- one rooted in familiar styles such as doom, Gothic and power metal, but utilizing the seemingly contradictory element of a sweet, female voice to offset the music's reigning aggression. In their case, this vocalist is operatically trained soprano Floor Jansen, whose contributions bring bands like the Gathering, Tristania, and Nightwish to mind. Alongside guitarists Sander Gommans and Mark Jansen, bassist Luuk van Gerven, keyboardist Jack Driessen, and drummer Joep Beckers, she helped transform mid-'90s metal band Apocalyps into After Forever while most members were still in their teens. Signing with Transmission Records, the band issued their debut album, Prison of Desire to great acclaim in the year 2000, then quickly followed it with 2001's more refined Decipher (featuring new keyboard player Lando van Gils, and drummer Andre Borgman). With their profile now rising fast (at least domestically), two singles, "Emphasis" and "Monolith of Doubt," were extracted from the latter album to title E.P. releases, and Floor also found time to lend her talents to space-metal composer Arjen Anthony Lucassen's vaunted Star One project. 2003 saw the release of an EP/DVD named Exordium & Insights, and after replacing original guitarist Mark Jansen with Bas Maas, After Forever released their third full-length album in 2004's Invisible Circles.