by Antti J. Ravelin

Sentenced's Frozen was a slight disappointment for their older fans -- the overall sound was poppy and the whole record seemed to be just a drunken side project. Unfortunately, Crimson continues even further in the direction of Frozen: the sound has been simplified and the songs are more depressing, so there appears to be no chance that Sentenced will return to Down or even to Amok. Still, Crimson is not a complete failure. Despite sounding like a bad copy of Type O Negative, it has its moments. The first single, "Killing Me Killing You," is a very fine song, although it resulted in Sentenced being accused of selling their souls to pop music. There are also some tracks that don't follow the theme of Crimson, with "Broken" and "Dead Moon Rising" actually sounding more like tracks from Amok. Crimson may enable Sentenced to attract a new audience from pop music, but definitely not from heavy metal.