The T 666 I've just heard MINDFLOW's 2006 work "Mind over Body" and I have to say, I'm at the same time impressed and disappointed.

I'm impressed (favorably) because the band is certainly a terrific, outstanding, amazing group of musicians. The vocals are nothing to write home about but the guitars and keys are just great. The level of playing that Hidalgo and Spada can achieve is demonstrated by the complicated textures, solos and the variety of styles that they go over in this release. No doubt the band is one of the great surprises in musicianship in the metal world. Even better to know that they come from Brazil, a land that has given us good power-prog-metal acts before (ANGRA), even though MINDFLOW is much more progressive in a typical way.

I'm impressed by the production values. Not only is the recording perfect and the sound of the disc something to really applaud; the band has also made an effort to provide its fans with one of the best booklet/cases, with beautiful artwork and even a whole song (and the album's concept) put into comic in a second booklet. The band takes the fans and its art seriously, and I really like that.

But there are some dissapointing elements to this album. And I find them where most people find this album's strengths: in the complexity of the music. I've given my opinion a million times: I love to hear technical displays of prowess and intricate structures, but not at the expense of coherence. I've hear Mind over Body more than a few times and I still think that it's very difficult to grasp any kind of structure in some of the songs. The musicians (very good nes, I say it again) lose themselves in change after change after change, never allowing a song to just, well, flow (pun intended).

Now, it can be said that some of the genre's best moments have arrived thanks to challenges to the traditional structures and to completely difficult-to-get songs. I agree. But I can't sense any sense of symphonism here: this is not something like Close to The Edge; I also can't sense any multi-sectionism a la Supper's Ready or A Change of Seasons (metallic rhapsodism?). I can't even detect the broad, far-reaching maps of many post-metal songs; what is even more deciding, I can't find riff to riff structures like in DEATH. Just to focus in the genre, PAIN OF SALVATION (wihout a doubt the band MINDFLOW tries to emulate) has never failed to have a sense of coherence, structure, song-craftmanship. Yet MINDFLOW has. And that is what ultimately dissapointed me about them.

The music? Complex progressive-metal with touches of DREAM THEATER, QUEENSRYCHE, but mostly, PAIN OF SALVATION. At times the band sounds too much like Gildenlow's creature. But without the art of the song that the Swede masters possess.

All in all, a good, if flawed album, by a band that I'm sure can very easily deliver a 5-star album in the future, should they choose to let the music flow and save some of the complexity for future releases.

The T 666 I've read the same comment many times when time comes to speak about prog-metal bands: "oh, this band is just a DREAM THEATERclone", "another one of the endless herd of DT clones", and as much as I tried, I never could find that one album that truly made me believe the same experiment that generated Dolly the Sheep was repeated with the New York band.

That is, of course, until I heard the voice of a lemur, disguised as a prog-metal band.

I have a serious problem with LEMUR VOICE: it sounds too much like DT, like "Awake"-era DT, to be precise. The cloning accusations really are on target this time, and I've begun some research to find out how someone got ahold of DT's ADN and used it to create this group.

The band LEMUR VOICE is no more, it has ceased to exist long ago. So there would be no point in me worrying about future releases. But, in case you're interested in buying this cd, I'll say a few words about the music.

This is really a copy/paste exercise. The musicians are very capable, and can surely play their instruments with skill and virtuosity. The problem is that the music itself is not that interesting. As I said before, it's very much reminiscent of "Awake", but without the inspiration, the melodies, the energy, and, especially, without the originality of that legendary release. Even though the songs aren't that bad, there's nothing new to listen to here. It also lacks punch; it's like the musicians are playing trying to emulate their favorite band but without even leaving his heart on the floor for that, without breaking a sweat, they seem like they were playing by inertia. And the singer? Well, he's just not good. His voice sounds like if FATES WARNING's Ray Alder had suddenly lost 10 years and also 10 pints of blood, as the delivery is bland, monotonous, bleak, lineal. Completely fuel-less.

About the songs, all sound about the same. The first track is the better one with vocals, and for sure the second one (the instrumental "Akasha Chronicles") is the best in the album. Actually, if they had recorded a purely instrumental album with more tracks like that one, it would have been a pleasant experience and worthy of maybe 3 or 4 stars. But, as it is, these two tracks barely save the album from 1 star status.

Stay away from the Lemur.

This is recommended for ultra-hardcore fans of DT that want ALL of their music to sound almost exactly like DT.

The T 666 It's a bit of an irony that, what ultimately killed the lemur was its voice.

I really don't know the reason behind the Dutch band's disappearance from the music world. But if the reason has anything to do with the band never getting a good record deal or never becoming famous at least within the progressive-metal community, I think the mediocre vocals of its singer have a lot to do with it.

The worst thing about the demise of LEMUR VOICE is that, actually, they were starting to become a truly competent and original prog-metal band. Here we had a group of musicians of the highest talent. An excellent drummer who was also the main lyrics writer for the outfit; a very skilled guitarist who was showing signs of extreme originality, with very unique riffs and ideas; a skilled bassist who played very interesting bass lines; a talented keyboardist who matched the abilities of the rest of the band. All of them were outstanding musicians, and that fact was starting to finally show in "Divided."

"Insights", the band's previous album, was interesting musically but failed to impress this listener with its lack of memorable songs and originality. LEMUR VOICE was very close to a DREAM THEATER clone in that record. But in "Divided", we can hear much more original music. While the influences are still there, there is a new, fresh sound that permeates the disc, with grunge and 70's-hard-rock overtones that add to the experience. The solos are better, the riffs and licks are way better. The songs have more interesting structures and everything seems to start to fall into place. The band manages to create songs that, though not immediately accessible, are much more memorable than some of the bland tracks in their debut. Just take a look at the excellent title-track or the very good "New Yanini" and you'll hear hints of greatness. The band even manages to pull out a decent (if a little awkward, especially in the jazz-styled chorus) Michael Jackson cover (of one of the pop legend's best songs, Beat It).

But lemurs can't sing. At least in nature they usually can't. And nowhere can one find better evidence to support that statement than in this album. If in "Insights" the vocals were slightly annoying, here in "Divided" they border on the atrocious. Of course, there is a reason: in the debut, the music was weak, therefore the vocals were just another weak element; but here, with much better sounds, the awful vocals fall so far behind the music in terms of quality that the contrast is too high and the image gets much more distorted. Van Der Loo's voice is too high, but that's not the biggest problem. It's too energy- less, too dead. It would seem that the singer was really bored recording this album because he really appears to be singing with absolute no conviction, no strength, no desire to reach anything but the moment when he could walk out of the studio.

And that's what kills this album in the end. The rating would have been higher if the vocals matched the quality of the music (I would go so far as to say that with an excellent singer this record could've gotten a 4.5 from me). But with what we have, "Divided" is just a tad above its predecessor, and it gets a 3.

This band doesn't exist anymore. And when one hears the vocalist singing, one stops wondering why...

The T 666 Another case of an unknown masterpiece.

SHAOLIN DEATH SQUAD, an American group nobody knows about, has delivered in a grandiose way with their 2006 album "Intelligent Design", a brilliant album full of great musicianship, innovation, creativity, and entertainment.

We can call this music progressive-metal, but not your typical DT-style prog-metal. We hear some elements of traditional bands, but mostly we hear an eclectic mixture of all kind of different influences, which combine to create a distinct, unique sound. We hear avant-garde elements, we hear some tech-metal touches here and there, we can detect musical passages that sound like DIABLO SWING ORCHESTRA but also moments when we're reminded of ARCTURUS. There's some thrash metal in here, too, with many fast riffs and pounding rhythms. Some alternative rock has managed to infiltrate the music as well. As you can see, a complete blend of many colors in the metal spectrum. But the influences we could say are the most important in SDS's sound are definitely two: PAIN OF SALVATION, but even more, FAITH NO MORE. Yes, SHAOLIN DEATH SQUAD's sound owes a lot to both Gildenlow's outfit and to Patton's deceased group.

A very important element in SDS's music is the quality of the musicians and specially of their singer. All the instrumentalists are more than capable, showing their skills but never falling for the easy show-off. But it's "The White Swan" who steals the show. Here we have a vocalist capable of switching styles with ease and tremendous creativity. He can go from a melodic, clean voice to a black-metal styled, high- pitched growling in a matter of seconds, in both cases managing to deliver a very compelling vocal performance. Again, his main influences are the same as in the overall sound of the band: Gildenlow, but mostly, Patton. It's his way of phrasing the words, the rhythms, and sometimes also the tone that remind us of that great singer of FAITH NO MORE and MR BUNGLE fame. "The White Swan" doesn't stop here though; he can also sound a little grungy (we can detect a hint of ALICE IN CHAINS in one of the songs) and, in the last track, he evokes Jonathan Davis, of much-maligned nu-metal band KORN. Yes, the guy has quite a range of possibilities in his voice.

The music goes from the burlesque to the violent, from the atmospheric to the grotesque, from the cold mountains of China to the exaggerated joke of a circus; there's anger and insanity, there's laughter and even some light; we travel from the traditional to the modern, from progressive-metal to thrash metal to space-rock to avant-garde.

One of the best cds of 2006, a year when many lost gems like this album or DIABLO SWING ORCHESTRA got buried underneath a pile of over-hyped records. It's a shame that this disc has been self-released. Let's hope SHAOLIN DEATH SQUAD is allowed to give us their talents with a label that can guarantee that more people will be exposed to great music like this.

The T 666 I think SIEGES EVEN has taken a step back with their latest release, "Paramount."

"The Art of Navigating by The Stars" was an absolutely amazing album, a big surprise for me and a sure 5-star. It was full of good melodies, some energy and also restraint. A masterpiece.

"Paramount" is a turn towards the mundane for this talented German band. In this album, gone are the intricate textures and RUSH-like phrases of its predecessor; gone are the great choruses and mostly the great riffs and rhythms of that album. In their place, we get a simple, much more direct, but also less inspired, bland metal album. It's very difficult at times to figure out the character of the music. The structures are typical, the performances are nothing extraordinaire, and there's not a single song that sticks in the mind.

It's like somebody gave the members a dose of a potent tranquilizer that not only numbs the muscles but also the inspiration, as some songs are incredibly (should I say it?) lame. No energy, no life, nothing that distinguishes one song from the others.

There are a few decent moments and the album is OK. But after such a gem as "The Art of Navigating by the Stars", this is such a tremendous dissapointment. A weak album, deserving 2.5 stars.

The T 666 This is a case of the parts being better than their sum.

As much as I like some of the bands these musicians come from, the result was far more disappointing than I expected it to be (few supergroups actually work, especially when there's not a clear head.)

Maybe the problem is that the band actually sounds more like the band I like the least out of the big variety of groups these musicians come from. This band doesn't sound much like DREAM THEATER, doesn't sound much like PLANET X, doesn't sound much like WINGER or DIXIE DREGS. I know, it's perfect for a band to have a unique sound, to be original, but oftentimes supergroups tend to be closer in style to one or two bands. And in this case, PLATYPUS' music bares similarities with that of KING'S X, an outfit I've never cared much for due to their simple, hook-less, bland music.

And that's what gets me from Ice Cycles: the lack of any really memorable melodies or choruses, the inability by the band members to produce anything that's worth trying to memorize. The music is hard-rock at its simplest, with only a few scattered attempts at showing a little bit of the potential of each band member. Myung's bass is simple, Morgenstein's drumming is ordinary, Sherinian's keys are mundane (even though at times he's the shiniest musician in this record), and Tabor's guitar is just competent. The best moment in the album is the instrumental 25 and parts of the last short-epic Quintology. The rest is as forgettable as many other supergroup albums that never quite reach the heights that we, quite naively, expect them to reach.

The T 666 Good musicians + terrible voice - originality = mediocrity. That equation sums all that I have to say about this copy/paste exercise.

Let me just very briefly elaborate in each constant in the equation:

Good musicians: well, the guys can play, and very well. Great guitarists, a very good drummer and very capable bass player. There's no room for complaining about the instrumentalists. The recording, by the way, is cristal-clear, so one can enjoy the quality of the players even more.

Terrible voice: DREAM THEATER's James Labrie has always divided the fans: either you love him or you can't stand him. I happen to like his vocals a lot. Now, what would happen if suddenly Labrie had a throat infection and couldn't sing, and his vocals chords were damaged in the process? Well, enter DIGITAL RUIN's singer to give us an answer: HE. He's exactly what I just described, Labrie after an earthquake, something like that. He's this band's weakest link. If you like DT and ever complained about LaBrie vocals during the AWAKE era (when he had problems and couldn't sing as well as always), then imagine that voice, take all the character off of it, and you have DIGITAL RUIN's voice.

Originality (or lack thereof): The music is very similar to DREAM THEATER, with hints of FATES WARNING and DREAM THEATER, also with influence from thrash metal and DREAM THEATER. There's not much originality in the music (I should also mention that at times they sound like DREAM THEATER).

Mediocrity: this music, besides all the problems I mentioned, is mediocre. I couldn't find a single chorus that was memorable, a single solo that played with my heart and with my mind. I could find a couple of decent riffs (mostly in the title track) but even the song structures are very simple.

Not a great album. It's not a tragedy as it has good musicianship, but it's not enough to warrant any recommendation.

The T 666 This was quite a surprise.

I really wasn't expecting much of this side project. I'm not much into side-projects. I've always felt that musicians tend to give their best to their main bands, and that side-projects are usually just ego-boosting attempts that usually end up being flat as each individual artist is not as good as the combination of a few of them forming a music group.

I was expecting that even more in the case of Joey Vera, a great bass player but never an outstanding member in his excellent band, FATES WARNING, where guitarist Jim Matheos and drummer Mark Zonder are the ones that generally steal the spotlight.

But in the case of A CHINESE FIREDRILL, Vera's most recent project, the complete opposite is true. Here we have an album of pure originality, great innovation, and full of energy and passion. This doesn't feel like a side-project. This feels as Vera's real thing. He's the absolute star as he plays all the instruments but one (the drums) and sings in "Circles", the first album under this name. Most importantly, he is the only songwriter, and thus he's been able to show us what a terrific, underrated musician we've always have hidden behind his bands' biggest names.

What we have here is an excellent collection of songs of the most varied style and mood. If we were to describe what this music sounds like, we would have to begin with TOOL, even though that influence is very important mostly in the first song, with its very distinctive riff. Another immediate influence is MUSE, especially in the calmer moments. PINK FLOYD's shadow permeates the whole album, as does PORCUPINE TREE's, for this is a very, very atmospheric, psychedelic record. One can hear a little, just a little of Vera's band FATES WARNING in the music, which goes from metal to space-rock to alt-rock with ease. The experimental bits owe a little to OSI, a side-project of his band mate Jim Matheos. But through all of these different mentors, Vera manages to create a thing that is completely his own and that sounds unique.

Talking about the performances, Vera shines in almost every instrument. He has good skills in the guitar, making it produce effects and notes of great beauty and atmospheric effect; he is a capable keyboardist, doing just what he needs to do to add to the magic; of course, he absolutely conquers when he's playing the bass, so there's little to question about that. But is his singing which is a good surprise. No, he's not the next Sinatra, but his voice, helped by effects that make it sound a little bit like Arjen Lucassen's one in any AYREON album, is sedative, narcotic, weirdly pacifying. He can also rock. At his side and rounding up a perfect team, Greg Studgio on drums delivers a magnificent performance, full of incredible creativity, amazing chops and fills, and tight, precise rhythm.

A word about the songs. From the first, "Circles", that has a very strong TOOL influence, to the last, "Rock Paper Scissors", the longest and most ambient of the record, we never feel like there's one wasted minute in this recording. Even though all of the tracks are great, my two favorites would be "Insane" and "Siucra", the first with a fantastic little figure which could very easily be an alt-pop- rock hit if it had any chance at airplay, the latter with an infectious chorus and a nostalgic, questioning riff and melody.

An absolute success. I really confess I didn't have much expectatives coming from Circles but, lucky me, I was incredibly wrong. A must for fans of space-psychedelic-metal, and all rock music fans in general.

The T 666 A very entertaining and interesting album.

ECHOES OF ETERNITY's style is a mix of gothic metal, thrash metal and power-epic metal, with hints and touches of progressive-metal here and there, like the song structures which are not always regular or the interaction between the drums and the guitar riffs which transcend the usual one in most power metal. Also, there are acoustic passages that add variation to the music and many instrumental moments that, altogether, create a music with a distinct sound, if not particularly outstanding.

The musicians are gifted. The main star here is Patton, the guitar player, whose riffs are the blood that drives this album home. This is true riff-based metal and it's no wonder most of the riffs are very interesting and enjoyable. Some are just OK but in general Patton displays good technique. Carrsion on drums does a god job even though at times he lacks variation: his style is too dependent on Patton's guitars and that stops him for doing more with his hands and the parts of his kit. The bass playing is simple and effective. Francine Boucher, the singer, has a good voice that, in my view, doesn't match the power of Floor Jansen of AFTER FOREVER, for example, but in the lower moments it has real beauty. Boucher has a few diction problems, mostly in the track "Voices in a Dream" (the best in the album), where she can't pronounce the word "dream" which somehow ends up sounding like "jin". (?!)

The music is very enjoyable and effective. I see a lot of potential here. So my rating for this album is 3 stars out of 5. A good album that's not essential. ECHOES OF ETERNITY, though, has all in them to become a great, essential metal band. They're just beginning, and for a debut album, this is a success.

The T 666 ROYAL HUNT is (was?) a very good band, sometimes standing near the threshold of greatness. The vocalist for the first albums was one of the most underrated singers in metal: D.C. Cooper. After he departed, John West of ARTENSION fame took his place and at first he really stood up to the challenge: he made a lot of fans forget the former's frontman departure. After a good debut album, "Fear", came "The Mission", a good effort. Then I lost track of this band for a while. I didn't get their latest (before this one), "Eyewitness", so my re-encounter with the Danish turned out to be "Paper Blood".

Now, ROYAL HUNT had always been characterized by a fast, driving style of progressive-metal, with a lot of classical influences (from the baroque era), some New Wave of british Heavy Metal (mainly MAIDEN) thrown into the mix, but all of that dominated not by the sound of guitars, but by the sound of keyboards. As Andre Andersen, keyboard player, is the true "owner" of this band (writes most of the music and lyrics), his instrument, until now, had been the prevalent one in all ROYAL HUNT albums.

But that keyboard-driven sound was a controlled, organized, melodious one. In the earlier records they used to have a lot of middle tempo songs with hard, heavy guitar riffs and powerful, heroic chords; sometimes the keyboards were used for atmosphere; when it came to soloing, you could hear every key and note that was being played, so crystal-clear and well-thought the Andersen solos used to be. "Paradox" was a masterpiece , "Fear" was a great follow-up.

But all of this is past history. "Paper Blood"'s ROYAL HUNT is a complete mess made of, almost exclusively, ultra-lightning fast songs; today's RH is just a bad power-speed metal band, with more predominance by the guitars than usual, and it's a shame because this was a keyboard band mainly. But at the same time, it is a sort of saving grace for RH that Andersen is no longer the only spotlight, for his playing today is just as irrelevant, muscular and no-brains as the music he's writing: light-speed solos where scales come and go, up and down. This album must hold the record for most scales per square minute, and a waste of minutes at that, for there's no melody in those solos, just boring scales.

Songs are very weak. No great choruses here in any of the tracks, no good verses... and John West... Where's the fantastic singer we had in the previous albums? He's just yelling, screaming, sustaining notes, there's no singing. But maybe it is not his fault, for he doesn't really have any melodic material to work with. The best track may well be the title track, if only because I remember how the chorus goes.

Atrocious. Terrible album for a band like Royal Hunt, with such talented musicians.

The T 666 When I learned that ROYAL HUNT's new album would be named "Paradox Part II" I was surprised and quite afraid of what I would find. After all, my last experience with this excellent Danish band had been a disaster (the utterly atrocious "Paper Blood"). Then I came to know that the album would feature a new vocalist, replacing John West. My fears were growing in my mind. Not only the predecessor was an awful album, but this one wouldn't even have a great asset as West's vocals were for the band. And, of course, the number 2. Sequels in movies are usually of dubious nature and quality, but in music they're quite a rare phenomenon. I haven't heard of a "Dark Side of the Moon 2" or "Images and Words 2". My most immediate memory of a sequel was QUEENSRYCHE's "Operation Mindcrime 2", an album that, while not bad, was not even close to match the quality of the original masterpiece.

Here, the task was also hard. The original "Paradox" was a progressive-metal masterpiece, an album rarely criticized, with great music, catchy music, a fantastic singer (D.C. Cooper) and even a great lyrical theme. So how would ROYAL HUNT do a decent job of writing a sequel if they didn't have the same great singer or at least his very good successor, and the last we heard of them was a complete uninspired fast-metal bore fest?

Well, the answer is: don't try too hard and just copy/paste. That's the philosophy that seems to transcend from my listening sessions of "Collision Course".

The first thing to notice is that the album starts with the same notes as "Paradox." The same music opens the record and from that point on, the music will remain generally very similar to that of the 1997's magnum opus. In fact, the music is so strikingly similar that even Boals' vocals, at times, sounds similar to DC Cooper.

But that's only an illusion. The first element that hurts this album is the vocalist. Don't get me wrong: he's good. He's a very capable singer with good pipes and range. But he lacks that uniqueness factor that made Cooper the star he was. Cooper's voice may not be the best ever, but the tone of his voice is definitely unique and imposing, and in such a dark, ominous album as "Paradox" was, his voice sounded outright creepy. Boals doesn't have that kind of power nor does he have the power and epic reach of John West. Maybe Boals would have sounded much better with happier, lighter metal music. He may sound better in ANGRA or even in other ROYAL HUNT's albums where the tone of the work doesn't demand a dark voice. But in an album about the nefarious influence of religion, Boals' vocals sound too optimistic.

The music itself is quite an improvement over the atrocious "Paper Blood." Finally, it seems Andersen has realized that one can play music at different speeds and with some melody. We have good choruses here, we have some good melodies, songs with different tempos, and typical classical- influenced ROYAL HUNT keyboards with ascending and descending scales, the main element that was lost in the guitar-dominated predecessor.

But, ultimately, the good points about "Collision Course" are also the ones that hurt it most. The album is too similar to "Paradox", the melodies and the ideas in general seem literally taken from that record and pasted onto this one with just a few changes in harmonies and tonalities. It wouldn't be crazy to call this record, paraphrasing immortal classical works' titles, "Variations on a theme by Royal Hunt for Metal Ensemble and Singer."

We understand that, for a part 2 to be a true sequel, it has to share elements with its correspondent part 1. The use of some themes and melodies from the original piece is not only correct but necessary. But we can't justify a whole record made of the same sound. The similarities transcend the singular to go into the general. Not only a few melodies sound the same, the music as a whole sounds the same.

After I've said that, my rating can't be as high as it would be for the original album. "Paradox" would obtain 5 stars with no hesitation. If that album didn't exist, I would give this newer one 4 stars (the music is not as memorable anyway). But as the 1997 masterpiece is a reality, I have to bring down the rating a little bit to a 3. It's still a big success after the 1-star music-murder that was "Paper Blood."

This album sounds very similar to a masterpiece, and that's actually its biggest flaw. Isn't that a Paradox?

The T 666 Not as great as PAGAN'S MIND best.

My only previous experience with this band comes from the album "Celestial Entrance". That album was filled with excellent songs and just a couple average ones. Sadly, the opposite is true in "God's Equation."

To those who haven't heard this band in the first place, PAGAN'S MIND sounds as close to a perfect mix of DREAM THEATER and STRATOVARIUS as you'll ever find. Here we have authentic progressive-power-metal, power metal with a lot of progressive elements or at times actually progressive metal with a distinct power metal sound. The high, heroic vocals, the heavy-but-not-annoying use of bass drums, shredding solos and speed, all is here, blended with odd time signatures, extended songs and instrumental passages, structures that are not typical, atmospheric moments and great craftsmanship.

What this album lacks that "Celestial Entrance" didn't is the great melodies and choruses. To honor the "power" element of a band, choruses have to be epic and memorable, they have to be the focus towards which the verses and other sections of songs inevitably conduce us. But in "God's Equation" we don't get as many of those as in that earlier album. Here we don't have any power-prog masterpiece as "Through Osiris Eyes" was in the 2002 great opus. The closest we get is probably in the second track (first song proper), "God's Equation." But even that good chorus doesn't reach the same level of grandeur that some choruses had in previous releases. It's like the band focused (and a lot) in writing some cool riffs and solos but couldn't stay focused for the climaxes of their anthems.

The musicianship here is top-notch. And that makes the lack of great melodies even more disappointing. When a band doesn't have a great singer or a skilled guitar player, it's easier to understand non-memorable songs. But when a band has a singer of the caliber of Rue, a guitarist of the skills of Lofstad, of a keyboardist with the precision of Tegner, it should just follow that they should write outstanding songs. They have done it in the past. They only achieve it halfway here in "God's Equation."

All in all, not a bad album by any means. This is good power-prog-metal, but not great. For true great albums, try SYMPHONY X's "V: The New Mythology Suite" or PAGAN'S MIND "Celestial Entrance." "God's Equation" is an enjoyable listen, but ultimately disappointing.

The T 666 A very entertaining if somewhat formulaic album.

Australia's VANISHING POINT play traditional by-the-book progressive metal. Longer-than-average songs, virtuosic performances, lush keyboards and pianos (even though there's no mention of any keyboardist in the booklet, not even as a guest musician), good vocal harmonies and some interesting bass lines.

But, at the same time, the band plays by the rules but never dares to break them or go too far with them. Their songs are longer than the usual metal track but never reach the 6 minute mark. Their solos are good but never dazzle the listener, neither are they really that extended. Keyboards are mostly used for background purposes. The vocal melodies are catchy but never adventurous, and the harmonies are very simple, even if they tend to sound attractive.

The main influences I can detect in this band's sound are DREAM THEATER (though not as evident as in other groups), SYMPHONY X, EVERGREY, POVERTY'S NO CRIME, and power-metal outfits like DRAGONFORCE or classics like IRON MAIDEN. VANISHING POINT, though, actually manages to have a sound of their own, even if kind of formulaic. The band has, in a way, dissected the sound of all of those influences, stripped them of much of their flashiness and pomp, and come up with a collection of songs that achieve a basic goal: entertain the listener. What this music fails to do is to captivate one's attention as there's really not much to read between the lines but what's evident and presented to us. In that matter, the closest reference for their sound would be late-EVERGREY, a band also notorious for playing the safest brand of progressive-metal (especially in their still-excellent "The Inner Circle" and their atrocious "Monday Morning Apocalypse").

And to EVERGREY we return when we want to describe the vocals of VANISHING POINT. Massaro sounds like a mix of that band's Englund with Russell Allen and, at times, a little bit of PAIN OF SALVATION's Daniel Gildenlow. Massaro's voice is fine and is pleasing, though never amazes. The same can be said of the rest of the band. The drums are played with precision but there's barely a moment when we can say we heard the musician do something really unique. The guitars are fast and the solos are very melodic, yet short and safe. The bass never tries anything out of the ordinary. Finally, the keyboards, which add atmosphere and drama to the music, aren't even acknowledged in the booklet. If one only reads it, it would seem this band doesn't include pianos or keys. But it only takes 2 seconds into the album to notice their existence (the entire opening riff of the disc is supported by keyboards(?!).

The songs are written in pretty standard verse-chorus-verse structures. The choruses are quite catchy and melodic, at times epic and heroic, and are usually the best parts of each one of the tracks. The chorus for the first song, Embodiment, is a clear example of EVERGREY's and Englund's influence on this band, at least on this record.

To sum it up, "The Fourth Season" is a good but not great album. It is saved by the good hooks of its songs which create a very enjoyable experience. I think 3 stars will do just fine.

The T 666 After a fair –if not great- debut album, legendary Norwegian black metal band SATYRICON came back with their sophomore record, “The Shadowthrone”. Therein one can start to notice some of the ideas that would be more fruitful in their third release, their masterpiece, “Nemesis Divina”.

The biggest difference between this album and its predecessor, “Dark Medieval Times”, is the quality of the recording, which allows the listener to understand the music more clearly and further helps Satyr’s good ideas to be appreciated. Although I wouldn’t love a totally-pristine and crystal-clear production for a black metal record (it would go against the genre’s principles and would erode the magic that the poor sound generates), when the music is more complex than average for the genre, as it’s the case with SATYRICON, the typical extra-low-fi recordings of black metal can hide some important details that, if heard, could elevate the experience to an even higher point of enjoyment.

This is exactly the case with this album, whose songs tend to be longer and more elaborated than contemporary bands of the 90’s like DARKTHRONE. On this album one can find choirs, keyboards and even some pianos. Anyway, not everything is perfect in the land of Satyr, Samoth and Frost. Glorious riffs like the one that would inform "Mother North" in “Nemesis Divina” are not here yet, even if some little sparks of genius can be heard. Some songs get lost in irrelevance when the music wanders off for longer than necessary. The sound of the record lacks that magic that was present on the debut and also on the third album whereby we were transported over cold forests and mountains overcome by a dense fog. Here, the scenery is diffuse, and, curiously, at the same time too immediate, too direct. A good work that deserves a listen but only after having visited the truly essential contributions of SATYRICON to the black metal genre: both the album that predates this, and the one that came after “The Shadowthrone.”.

The T 666 I was expecting another power-metal-with-progressive-elements band a la AFTER FOREVER here, with a female singer and the casual use of orchestras. But I was partially wrong.

EPICA surely plays power-metal, but the progressive elements are much more evident here than in many other similar bands. First, the songs are intelligently written, with a few of almost epic length and with structures that, if traditional, tend to at least fool the listener into thinking they're quite different. Second, the orchestra and choir here are not used as a gimmick or mere background but as an integral part of the sound, sometimes even adding to the riffs. Think on a more power-metal version of THERION. The mixing of the metal and orchestral elements really creates a band that deserves to be called progressive.

Much has been said about Simone Simons' vocals, and I have to agree in this case: her voice is fantastic. Mixing the operatic with the more pop-oriented, Simons delivers an excellent performance and a great contrast for Mark Jansen, who does all the growling in the record. It's important to notice that, again, we're not in the presence of a mere gimmick here. The dark vocals have a lot of importance in the record, carrying some vital sections either in the way of low-pitched death growling or its higher black metal variation. Jansen shows skills in being able to switch between the two at ease, but in the end, of course, he's completely overshadowed by Simons beautiful voice. She can carry a melody in any direction. She can soothe you with her peaceful chant or encourage you with her heroic cry; force you to imagine a lonely, blue lake or a lavish, red Opera stage.

The music is very riff-driven, with several power-metal elements like double-bass drums and epic choruses, but scattered throughout the disc are sections of outstanding beauty but also of sudden violence, where the music, for a few seconds, borders on death or black metal.

The obvious influences here are female-fronted bands like AFTER FOREVER or even NIGHTWISH, power-prog bands like SYMPHONY X or KAMELOT, but also some less-obvious ones as AYREON and THERION or even Hollywood music like Jerry Goldsmith's "The Omen" soundtrack. The musicianship is top-notch, with excellent performances of all the artists involved, even though the real star here is the vocalist, followed closely by the interaction of guitars and orchestra in a way that seems coherent, necessary, and which works perfectly. The good alternation of fast-and-energetic songs with quiet interludes (a few even with some oriental melodies) is another success.

In the end, we have a very good album that shares some of the mistakes that other bands in this style make in their works (similar songs, simple structures, virtuosic-yet-not-creative performances, cheesy latin-language intros). But the experience is a highly enjoyable one, the virtues overcome the flaws by far, and ultimately the album satisfies the listener. This is excellently-crafted power-prog-metal music, and an excellent if not essential addition to your collection.

The T 666 There's no need for my describing how this band sounds like or what their major influences are. The female-fronted, power-metal Finnish outfit is widely known around the globe and doesn't need an introduction.

This is NIGHTWISH's first album with their new vocalist, Annete Olzon, and while her voice may not be as powerful or wide-ranged as that of her predecessor, Tarja Turunen, I think it's safe to say that her inclusion in the band has helped to make it a better group.

The reason lies exactly in the comparatively-lower range and power of Olzon. Now that Holopainen (the band's mastermind) has a more delicate and normal voice to work with, he has been forced to improve his songwriting, expand the array of instruments his music needs, and create songs that fit his vocalist as perfect as possible.

That's why, in "Dark Passion Play", we hear better songs. Unlike other NIGHTWISH albums, we are not bored after four or five repetive tracks here. All the tracks are good because they're varied, with lots of moods and tempos. A lot of atmosphere has been brought into the mix. The orchestration has been given much more emphasis and importance on this record. Melodies are better, choruses are better. To compensate for the lack of sheer power of Olzon's vocals, more male voices have been added, now taking close to 40 percent of the album's time.

The first sign of the quality of this new album by NIGHTWISH is the first song, without a doubt the best in the album. "The Poet and The Pendulum" amazes with its unusual structure, its heroic and memorable chorus, its energy, it's breathtaking musicianship. Probably the best song in the band's career. Other highlights are "Whoever Brings The Night" and "7 Days of the Wolves."

The musicianship as always is top-notch, as it's the crystal-clear recording. Olzon's clean, soft, tender and magical voice can be heard with clarity and the moments when she sings the most melodic parts of the record are excellent, of a rare power-metal beauty. Holopainen and the guitarist don't need to prove themselves, but they continue to impress.

All in all, this is NIGHTWISH's best album so far. With a few more songs in the vein of "The Poet and The Pendulum", this could get closer to a 5 star rating. Let's hope the future is even shinier for the Finns.

The T 666 At one point in my life, I owned every single studio album by the band then-called just RHAPSODY. Eventually, for reasons left unsaid, I was forced to let most of them go and ended up in my collection with only my favorite of their records, the original "Symphony of Enchanted Lands." If RHAPSODY was one of the bands I chose to partially got rid of at that time it's because I realized their albums sounded pretty much the same.

Yes, I love the heroics and the epic choruses and the orchestral arrangements and the use of harpsichords/clavicembalos (an instrument that, were it not for this band and others like it, would be completely unknown for many of today's baroque-music-ignoring rock fans.) But I found a problem with most every RHAPSODY album except for the one I mentioned as my favorite: after a fantastic orchestral intro and a terrific anthem-like first song, the subsequent tracks are not in the same level and tend to sound so similar to each other (and to the tracks in the other albums) that the whole experience is somewhat ruined for me.

I will review "Symphony of Enchanted Lands" soon and I'll explain why I think it's the best RHAPSODY album. But focusing in "Triumph or Agony", their first record under the new copyright-forced name, I can say that it shares the same qualities and the same mistakes of most every opus by this Italian band.

We get a terrific orchestral intro. After that, the first song, the title-track, sets us off in an excellent way. The verse is powerful and mighty and the chorus is inspiring. Things don't change that much afterwards, though. We get the obligatory quiet moment with Leone singing over a soft accompaniment in keys; we get a quiet interlude with the harpsichord taking center stage along with some flutes and soft winds; we get the mandatory longest track in the end with lots of purely orchestral-moments and voice acting by different actors, among them the legendary Christopher Lee. In a word: we get the traditional, very enjoyable, RHAPSODY OF FIRE experience. We just don't get anything new.

I don't have anything against bands that repeat successful formulas. If this album had the same amount of great songs as "Symphony of Enchanted Lands", I would rate it higher, even if it wasn't the groundbreaking record that many prog purists always demand. I can tolerate not-so-original music when it is extremely entertaining and when it's perfectly crafted. Sadly, "Triumph or Agony", while certainly perfectly played, does not have enough great choruses or memorable melodies for me to rate it higher.

The playing, as always, is first-rate. The magnificent shredder Luca Turilli returns with more of his wonderful technique, alongside master keyboardist Staropoli and the competent rhythm section. Fabio Leone, a very underrated singer who in my view should be consider among the best melody-singers in metal, gives a terrific performance though not in the same level as in previous albums.

Ridiculous lyrics aside , I love RHAPSODY (OF FIRE), and when I review their best album I will probably give it 5 stars, as I think it is a masterpiece in this style of music. But "Triump or Agony", their latest release, is more than a tad weaker and, though enjoyable, fails to be the awe-inspiring heroic experience of other efforts. 3 stars is what it deserves, as it's still an entertaining, soul-lifting record that, its problems notwithstanding, will never depress anyone who hears it, as this music sings of triumphs, glory and courage.

The T 666 HEAVEN'S CRY surely is an original band. They play a very unique brand of progressive-metal that doesn't rely exclusively on riffs and that puts a lot of emphasis on textures. They have three guitars playing at all times, creating amazing harmonies that are this band's best feature. Their song structures are not completely regular, and even though the band never seems to try to show-off their abilities, they have a very distinct tech-metal sound at times. Their focus on short and concise songs rather than on long epics give them the possibility to create complex tracks without ever making them sound boring. They love odd-time signatures, and the rhythm section tends to show constant funk influences here and there. It's, overall, a pretty outstanding group.

If we were to talk about what they sound like, here we would have to discard, unlike in most progressive-metal bands, DREAM THEATER. The influence may exist, but it never shows. Neither does any hint of QUEENSRYCHE. If we had to pick the one founder of the prog-metal genre HEAVEN'S CRY sounds the most like, it would definitely be FATES WARNING, even though it would be quite a stretch, as they ultimately don't sound the same. This Canadian band, as said before, sounds a little bit like SPIRAL ARCHITECT but without all the complications and (at times) nonsense displays of virtuosism. ICE AGE, another unknown prog-metal band (which sadly disappeared after showing a lot of promise and releasing two great albums) would be a good comparison, but whereas that group sounded much more like the traditional prog-metal names, HEAVEN'S CRY adds a lot of external influences. I'm constantly reminded throughout the record of grunge music, and there are moments where the vocal harmonies strike a big resemblance to ALICE IN CHAINS. Going back to progland, another huge influence seems to be PAIN OF SALVATION, and in many of the vocals, NEAL MORSE.

Most songs here don't rely on memorable riffs to survive. The band starts most tracks with rather obscure riffs, and build upon them adding layer after layer of guitars and harmonies. Their guitar work is their best feature and we have to applaud them for it. The atmospheric intros to "Remembrance" and "One of Twentyfour" are perfect examples of that. But surely the most amazing moment in the album must be the strangely ambiguous, somewhat dissonant and captivatingly jazzy intro to "Divisions".

So what is not to like in "Primal Power Addiction"? for all the sheer brilliance of the guitar work, the band finds it difficult to write truly memorable songs. For my taste at least, music can't survive only on harmony. Melody is vital, and it's somewhat missing here in this album. There are no songs that stuck in my mind even after repeated listens. The problem may lie in the fact that the band avoids adhering to the usual structures, but even more so in the fact that the melodies are not at all memorable, and that most songs sound alike. The riffs are interesting but lack character, and the rhythm of the tracks is pretty similar; the singing doesn't help matters and we're left with a collection of extremely-well-played songs with incredible textures that, sadly, fail to leave any everlasting impression on the listener, and that sound too similar to each other.

About the musicians a word we can say: they're terrific. All three guitarists create a intricate texture full of colors and sound and also are capable of some displays of amazing technique. The bass is always a star in this record, and the drums are quite original and demand virtuosity. St. Jean's vocals owe a little to Daniel Gildenlow of PAIN OF SALVATION, but also a little to singers like NEAL MORSE. For further proof, checking the "High Moral Ground" or "Paradigm" would be source for good evidence. His voice, while versatile, is not really that melodic, and it contributes to make the record a somewhat dull experience.

All in all, a very, very interesting record from a purely musical point of view. The three-guitar work and the uniqueness of the music surely deserve commendation. But the lack of any hook or at least memorable moments make "Primal Power Addiction" a somewhat dry experience. When the only likeable tune in the record is a cover (a very weak version of MIDNIGHT'S OIL "Beds are Burning", harmed by the awful funkiness of the drummer in that track), it's clear that the band could still use some time to improve their songwriting while keeping the fantastic elements like the harmonic work. For the quality of the music, it gets a 4. My experience with the album was not successful from a personal point of view, and I bring the rating down to a 3.

It's still recommended to anybody looking for original and truly progressive progressive-metal. But ratings reflect taste, and HEAVEN'S CRY is not my kind of addiction.

The T 666 A very nice debut album.

VOTUM's first album has a few of the problems typical of debuts: the sound is still not perfect, the music is still a little bit derivative, and, instrumentally, there are a few issues that have to be fixed. But in general, "Time Must Have a Stop" is a very pleasant experience.

VOTUM's sound owes a lot to another progressive-metal band from Poland: RIVERSIDE. As with the latter, the former employs techniques learned from the psychedelic masters of the 70's and fuses them with elements of heavy metal, art-rock and, at times, gothic rock. But there are differences: RIVERSIDE is even darker, the music is even less optimistic, whereas VOTUM still manages to sneak a ray of light through the somber soundscapes. VOTUM plays a much more "metal" style of progressive-metal, and they don't dwell as much in psychedelic passages as their Polish peers.

Another huge influence in VOTUM's music is undoubtedly PINK FLOYD, whose art is present in most every band that plays dark psychedelic rock or metal today, as is the case in another one of VOTUM's references, PORCUPINE TREE. The spacey, atmospheric, narcotic mood of Steven Wilson's music never leaves the background of this Polish band's paintings. The vocals appear to have been molded following the English's musician example. On the metal side of things, besides the usual suspects, a band we're constantly reminded of while listening to "Time Must Have a Stop" is OPETH. There's almost zero growling or death-riffs here, but the dark atmospheres and many of Mikael Akerfeldt's musical tricks are easy to be found in this debut album. VOTUM mixes all these influences in a coherent new sound that will appeal both to the progmetal fan and to the art-rock aficionado.

As I said earlier, there are a few glitches here and there. The recording is clear but the drums sound very cardboard-ish, and the drummer himself gives quite a weak performance. His fills usually sound cut, sloppy, incomplete, at times he's on the verge of destroying the flow of the music with his almost- inept cascades that have no creativity behind them. At least he's good at keeping a steady rhythm, but he seriously has to work in his fills if VOTUM plans to go further than Poland's border with him sitting on the drum seat. The rest of the musicians fare pretty well, especially both guitarists. The vocals are OK, if not brilliant.

The songs are simple yet never too-accessible. Their structures are rather normal but never uninspired. The music is very melodic and there are a few moments of pure beauty throughout the album. The atmospheres that VOTUM is able to create are very unique, and are one of the best features in this album. The melodies are good and at times memorable.

All in all, a very good debut album, worthy of much commendation. If VOTUM works their problems out for their next release, they could reach the highest level. Right now, I'm happy to give this opus 3.5 stars.

The T 666 I think I've found out what the problem of pain is. Well, it's painful! And I really don't need an album full of mediocre music to tell me that. Or, actually, I guess it was all designed to be this way. After all, what better way to learn about the problem of pain than having to endure the painful experience of listening to this record?

First of all, I don't know about the "metal" part of the progressive-metal categorization of this band. Maybe in their earlier albums they were heavier, but what we have here is retro-rock with some hard guitars here and there, weak vocals that seem to come straight from the 80's, and some guitar solos. That's as heavy as this album gets. Overall, it's a hard rock album, nothing more than that.

The music is very uninspired. It's supposed to be inspired by the "highest" of sources (for religious people, what could be higher than, well, religion itself?), but it rarely comes out as anything but a weak exercise in hard rock with preachy lyrics that teach nothing and mean nothing. What are we to learn from Job's tale? Probably what we can truly learn is how not to write a coherent tale to convince millions that not-questioning things is the best way to go. Maybe this is another designed effect. After all, Job's supposed to have had enormous patience. The same patience we have to have with this album.

Don't get me wrong. It's not that it's the religious factor the one that hurts the album. There are people that believe in things like that, and that factor hasn't stopped them from releasing masterpieces (check NEAL MORSE's "Sola Scriptura" for the best example: a music masterpiece with religion as subject of the lyrics). Ultimately, an album with bad lyrics or a poor concept can survive if it has good music. It's the MUSIC what is lacking here in this TORMAN MAXT record.

The songs are incredibly short, therefore they don't have time to develop into anything really. There are just a few good moments here and there, mostly when the keyboards are left to their own devices (like in the final moments of the whole album). The "Overture" is not all that bad. But from "Job's song" on, the album gets really weak. That song, for example, starts decently enough, but then the guitar seems to be out of tune (or playing out of key), and the riff is so mundane, so hard-rock-bar-in-any-lost-town-in-America-like that it's difficult to see anything redeeming about it. Arpeggios without beauty, choruses that aren't memorable. And a song called "Satan's first song" that it's so un-evil that it can't have the desired effect. The way the band tries to convey the idea of evil is by recording a few moments of feedback and noise at the end of the song. Not incredibly original.

The musicianship of the band is just ok. The drummer is capable but not very original. The bass and keys are decent. The guitarist is obnoxious. Yes, he can solo a little bit, but sometimes (and more often than not) he seems to be out of key. The vocalist is not that good, and has too much a soft voice that doesn't convince anybody of anything.

All in all, a very weak album, bordering on atrocity. I'll round my rating down, and give TORMAN MAXT the necessary stimulus to come back with a better effort than this.

You know, believing in god just by itself won't make you write good music.

The T 666 Unlike IHSAHN or other progressive-black-metal bands that borrow black metal elements and paste them upon a progressive-rock skeleton, what astounded me about ENSLAVED the first time I listened to their album "Isa" was that this band still sounded like black metal, only a "progressed" version of the genre. In the record we don't find that many odd time signatures, we don't find too many virtuosic solos, sudden tempo changes or abrupt displays of technical prowess; in this record most of the songs share the same spirit, the instruments are pretty much the standard for black metal, as are the structures, a little chaotic and difficult to figure out at times. There are clean vocals here, but 75 percent of the time we have honest-to-god (or Satan should I say) high-pitched guttural devilish vocals. Even the recording is not entirely pristine, though million times better than the typical for the Norwegian founders (MAYHEM, DARKTHRONE, IMMORTAL, EMPEROR). In a word: this is still black metal!

But this also is, more precisely, progressive black metal. This is the real thing. ENSLAVED plays the music as it has always been, but has progressed and progressed their music in a way that was groundbreaking for its time.

The songs, as I said, are a little chaotic in structure, but in this case this is not a problem, it only adds to the effect, the dark, desolating effect of this music. Most of the times it's played at middle tempos, in what may be the main divergence between this music and traditional Norwegian black-metal. But we have some tremolo-picking here and there, though, as I said, it's in the speed and in the atmosphere where ENSLAVED really takes the genre a step further.

"Isa" is full of atmosphere. It's a dark, evil album, but most of all a lonely, desolate, hopeless experience. In a way, at times it sounds very close to post-metal, to bands like AGALLOCH (coincidentally, that band tends to use black-metal-style vocals in their albums). The climate is one of pessimism, of defeat, which is a norm in nihilist black-metal, but now, with this extremely grey, slow, pensive music, it acquires a different, more real meaning.

The songs are of varied length and quality, but all of them at least manage to impress. Without a question, the highlights in the album are the title-track, probably the more accessible song; "Neogenesis", the longest one and the most full of surprises; and the absolute best, the magnificent "Bounded by Allegiance", which grabbed me from the very first time I heard it.

Small details are so important in music, and ENSLAVED pay a lot of attention to them, something quite radical in such a raw genre. Solos, scales, keyboards touches, arpeggios, all collide to create a fantastic voyage through the ice-cold seas of Scandinavia into the Maelstrom of Hell.

A masterpiece of extreme music. I'm surprised it's not mentioned more often in talks about the best the genre has to offer. But it certainly is a shining example.

The T 666 This was my first full-length experience with MOONSPELL. I have heard a few songs before but "The Antidote" was the only album that I found in one of my local record stores (I since found a couple more), so I bought it right away and it has been my introduction to the music of this Portuguese metal band.

The best way to describe "The Antidote" would probably be as gothic-extreme-progressive metal. In one side, we have, definitely, extreme metal, a big influence from Black Metal to be more specific; on the other hand, the slow, pensive songs filled with distant, lush keyboards and dark but sensuous atmospheres give the album a distinct gothic flavor. Finally, the abundance of short instrumental passages and some experimentation with structures and especially with orchestration help MOONSPELL sound progressive.

The songs are of average length, at about 5 minutes. Most of the structures are rather simple verse-chorus-verse ones, but some have special treatments in their form. The tempo of most tracks is usually moderate, not too-fast, not too-slow, even though it goes in both directions a few times. Guitars are the main drivers of this music with powerful riffs that are accentuated by grand, reverberating keyboards. There are some acoustic passages here and there that add to the variety. The vocals are of two kinds: on one hand we have regular extreme metal vocals, somewhere in the middle between low-pitched death grunts and high-pitched black growling; on the other hand, we have a rather lifeless, monotone, yet somehow seductive, clean gothic voice not unlike that of Peter Steele of TYPE O NEGATIVE if he was mixed with Johan Edlund of TIAMAT. Overall, the music also shows influences from these two bands, as well as black metal bands and more progressive-death bands like AMORPHIS (whose bassist plays on this record) or even OPETH.

The musicianship is very good if not dazzling. The vocals overpower the rest of the instruments for most of the album, but the guitar player and the keyboardist have their chance to shine, too. The drums are simple yet very effective. The bass is perfectly played by the Finnish guest. There are not many displays of technique but the playing is tight and precise, and one can easily detect the proficiency of these Portuguese musicians on "The Antidote".

The songs range from good to very good. The best probably are "Everything Invaded", which MOONSPELL wisely chose as their video in their homeland Portugal, "In and Above Men" a powerful opener that sets the mood for the rest of the album, and "As we Eternally sleep on it", the longest track. There are no weak songs here, but there aren't any outstanding masterpieces either.

All in all, an enjoyable experience that is hurt a little bit by the repetitive mood that permeates the album. A good introduction for the band and one that convinced me to invest a little more time into another MOONSPELL release.

The T 666 This is my first CANVAS SOLARIS experience and I can honestly say that it was very pleasing indeed.

The great thing about "Cortical Tectonics" is that is very technical without sounding pretentious, very difficult to play without sounding inhuman. We can very easily draw a comparison here with another tech-metal band, SPIRAL ARCHITECT. Whereas the latter's music is so ridiculously difficult to play that it seems like it wasn't played by actual human beings, CANVAS SOLARIS' tracks have complexity but in small doses. One's never overwhelmed by technique just for the sake of technique. There's never a section that sounds like it was forced in just to cause a deeper impression. All the passages fit, the difficult and the simple parts work together to create a uniform musical idea.

The riff, of course, is the main star in this album. This is progressive-metal, no doubt about it. At times it gets closer to extreme metal, but generally the pace of the music is middle of the road, with ferocious riffs alternating with quieter passages. All the instruments are played with the utmost level of proficiency. There's not much of a need for keyboards in "Cortical Tectonics". Three instruments, most of the time, manage to create a truly satisfying experience just by themselves.

As with most of this type of albums, sometimes instrumental-only technical records leave me a little bit cold. When I listen to rock and related music, I always need songs, I need some vocals. The good thing is that CANVAS SOLARIS is also capable of calmer, more melodic sounds. "Sinusoid Mirage" is a perfect example of that, and it's also the best track in all the album, with its elegant, refined opening that sounds more jazzy than metal.

All in all, a surprisingly enjoyable tech-metal instrumental album that I really recommend to every fan of the genre.

The T 666 While the album is nothing to write home about, it's a listenable disc of melodic death metal with hints of progressive-metal.

Evidently, the record is a step back after the very competent "The Scattering of Ashes" (pummeled by many critics, for reasons beyond me.) That disc was a very acceptable progressive-technical death metal effort, with hints of SYMPHONY X, PAIN OF SALVATION, but mostly with strong death metal elements. The songs were very similar in structure (verses with melodic choruses), the growling was efficient, and the riffs were technical and interesting.

All is not lost in "The Incurable Tragedy" but some of these strengths are not as evident now. First, the riffs and the different sections seem to have been arranged in the first order that came to the mind of the musicians; everything is a little bit chaotic here. Second, the vocals have gotten higher, at times barely resembling growling at all. The music is much more similar to melodic death metal bands like SCAR SYMMETRY or SOILWORK, but probably without the constant flashy elements of the former or the coherence of the latter.

This band suffers from the "show-off" syndrome of many extreme bands whose drummers think that constantly playing fills and double bass at incredible speeds ads any magic to the music. This "I'm-a-star" mentality, so typical of rock today, is also very present in metal bands, like INTO ETERNITY.

In the end, the right rating for the album is a 2.5.

Again, this is no 1-star album. It's listenable and entertaining, if not really brilliant.

The T 666 MOONSPELL swims between black-metal and gothic-metal waters in "Night Eternal".

The work of the band, originally a goth black-metal outfit, has become an hybrid of said genre with more commercial types of rock. This latest release starts strong, but loses steem towards the end. The best track in the album is "Dreamless (Lucifer and Lilith)", probably the most gothic one, very reminiscent of TIAMAT.

That MOONSPELL's best song is a more commercial-friendly one clearly shows how far the band has moved from its roots. When the group tries to play it black, the perfect production and the lack of crudeness and atmosphere don't allow the music to take off. The best song in the heavy side of the disc is the opener, "At tragic Heights".

Overall, the album is enjoyable but rather forgettable. It has its moments, but MOONSPELL has done better. And you can findway better works if you're looking for real black metal. For gothic-rock listeners, it may be too heavy a disc, but in the end it will work better.

The T 666 “Under a Funeral Moon”, the third album by Norwegian band DARKTHRONE, was the first work where the group all but abandoned the death metal style of their first two works and dived head-first in what would become their genre: black metal, in its purest, most effective form (for the next three full-lengths, that is.)

DARKTHRONE had already taken a few steps away from death metal in their second album, “A Blaze in The Northern Sky”, wherein some of the elements typical of the genre had already appeared, following MAYHEM’s path: the band members’ names were changed for nicknames (Nocturno Oculto, Fenriz, Zephyrous); the disc cover left out any hint of color, going full black style; the band members adopted the corpse-paint look (with their faces painted white with black details); but, above all, guitars were no longer tuned down, riffs started to get closer to punk than to death, the vocals got higher-pitched, and the album’s recording was deliberately impoverished. The album became a landmark in the emergence of the second wave of black metal, and DARKTHRONE, alongside EMPEROR and IMMORTAL, planted the seeds of a genre that even today is extremely popular in Scandinavia’s musical underground .

In my view, though, it’s in their third album, “Under a Funeral Moon”, where DARKTHRONE starts not only to look like, but to sound as a black metal band. The tremolo-riffs, riffs with very-fast tremolo picking of a single string, with more melodic than rhythmic weight, make their first appearance on this record, especially in the best song in the album, the opener, “Nastassja in Eternal Sleep”. For me, tremolo picking is one of the most important characteristics of the genre, the one which sets it apart of the rhythmical, irregular riffs of death metal, and what provides this genre with its magic. When you get tremolo-riffs in traditionally-tuned guitars (sometimes tuned even higher than normal) joined by fast blast-beats on the drums, you get a very special effect whereby the music’s speed stops being evident, and becomes apparent, you reach a kind of stasis, animation suspended on time, constant, very atmospheric thanks to the melody. If, to this combination, you add vocals straight from hell and a recording where it’s almost impossible to distinguish anything, you get music that is, ironically, beautiful in its ugliness, dreamy and magical in its darkness, its rusticity.

This is an uneven album. At times one can hear a band that still doesn’t know which route to take, even if it’s almost obvious that death metal is well dead. There are still some passages of clear death inspiration. DARKTHRONE would give everybody a lesson in how to create a true black metal album with their legendary “Transilvanian Hunger”, an album where the production values would reach an all-time low, but where black metal would finally emerge as the beast it is: crude, melancholic, at times magical. The band would later release one extra good album (“Panzerfaust”) and then it would finally disappear among the hundredths of bands that one day made history. But it was here, in “Under a Funeral Moon”, where one can find the origins of the most typical sound of Norwegian black metal. This is not a perfect album (no black metal album really is; the genre has chaos in its DNA), but it is worth a listen for many of the great songs in it, and for its importance in the evolution of the darkest of all metal genres.

The T 666 Definitely an improvement, though not quite there yet.

CIRCUS MAXIMUS's first album, "The 1st Chapter", left me with good expectations for the band's future, but also a little bit cold because of its derivative nature and the lack of brilliant melodies. Many people liked the choruses in that album, but I've heard many bands do much better than that. The band sounded like it was trying to sound like DREAM THEATER without really masking it.

This time around, in "Isolate", the band starts to find a voice of their own. The DREAM THEATER influence is still huge, and now we can also detect hints of SYMPHOPNY X and STRATOVARIUS in the mix, plus some PAGAN'S MIND (the vocal style is very similar.) But there's an inner voice, an until-now hidden personality in CIRCUS MAXIMUS that is starting to emerge. The music now doesn't sound too much "like band X" but more like "it was influenced by band X".

Also, the melodies and choruses are much better in "Isolate". A good example is "The Abyss", probably the best all-out-metal track in the album. The band's musicianship was never in question (no poorly-skilled musicians could ever sound like DREAM THEATER after all), but now with this newly gained confidence that I can hear between the notes, they shine even more. The production is superb, with clarity and values typical of more commercial-ready bands.

I think that CIRCUS MAXIMUS' best moments are yet to come. The band has been gaining ground slowly but steadily. From decent semi-clones to very good sound-a-likes, I'm sure the third chapter in this story will be the one where all elements finally fit in the puzzle. As of right now, "Isolate" deserves 3.5 stars , averaging musicianship, originality and the enjoyment I got from listening to it.

The T 666 This is a band with a bright future ahead of them.

AXIOM's first full-length album, "A Means to An End", can be described as a metal album first, a progressive metal album second. The band's clear focus was to give us a compelling, smooth-flowing, coherent collection of interrelated metal songs that attack the listener with very precise riffing, never losing the focus on the primary goal. The conceptual nature of the subject, the close relation between tracks (between which there are no pauses) and the excellent level of musicianship the band displays are the primary elements that help configure "A Means to An End" as a progressive-metal album.

As mentioned before, the main element in the music is metal. Precise, original riffs dominate every single song in the album. There's hardly any soloing for the mere sake of soloing. When Whisenhunt decides to take a moment on the spotlight for himself he does it because it's in the song's best interests to do so. We never get the idea that he is trying to show-off his skills; what he does is for the concept's sake. The same can be said of the work of the rhythmic unit, where the drums are probably the instrument that displays a greater degree of freedom throughout the record. But even Herzer, the skin- basher, controls his attack and doesn't try to steal the show for himself. It's all part of a conscious plan whose ultimate goal was to create a cohesive, intelligent conceptual prog-metal album. The band AXIOM comes before, the musicians that form the band are secondary in their scheme of things.

If we were to mention a few bands that AXIOM reminds us of in this record, METALLICA would probably be one of the first names to come to mind. In fact, at the beginning of the album, for a few seconds, we feel like if we were going back to the 80's, ready for our new dose of fantastic riffing. One of the songs even begins with a very similar drum/guitar pattern/fill to the one that opens the heavy part of "Blackened". On the more directly-progressive side of things, AXIOM clearly drank from the fountain of FATES WARNING. The album's structure clearly brings back memories of that band's legendary "A Pleasant Shade of Grey". The style of powerful singing that the vocalist employs is more akin to that of the aforementioned progressive-metal giant than to the much more sung, melody-based style that the other big prog-metal founder, DREAM THEATER, favors in their compositions. It's clear that other bands that the members of AXIOM have heard are metal legends like SAVATAGE and QUEENSRYCHE, but also more experimental bands like TOOL, more classic bands like PINK FLOYD and even bands in the post-metal genre with the grey, somewhat-nostalgic feel that permeates the album.

The musicianship is quite good in AXIOM, even though they still can get much better in some aspects. The drummer is clearly the most proficient instrumentalist in the record, with a perfect mix of restraint and acrobatics, using the hi-hat for interesting patters and the double-bass drums sparingly but powerfully enough to create a lasting impression. The bass does it job, we can't say it shines but we can't say that it disappoints either. The guitars, the main instruments in AXIOM, are somewhat of a mixed bag. Most riffs are very interesting and perfectly played. It's when the guitarist tries to solo that a few imperfections in his technique show a little bit, but they never take away from the quality of the sonic experience and the guitar playing never sounds sloppy or even mediocre. It just doesn't sound perfect. On the other hand, we have to praise the great amount of original ideas the 6-string instrument is able to display throughout the album.

The vocals are my biggest complain with AXIOM. Though not bad or distracting, they aren't that brilliant. Whisenhunt sounds a little like a less-powerful version of James Hetfield with a little bit of Ray Alder thrown in the mix. But he lacks the soaring heights that the latter reaches or the uniqueness that characterizes the voice of the former. Melody is not this singer's best skill, and there are times when it would have been of a huge benefit to this album to include more melodic sections and more easy-to-distinguish choruses. This is a department where AXIOM still has to improve.

All in all, a great debut for a very promising career. A few flaws in the vocals and the lack of great memorable melodies make me give this album a 3.5 over 5.

"A means to an end" is just what this album is, the first step towards achieving a goal, which doesn't seem to be too far to reach for AXIOM.

The T 666 This album has something for everybody.

Yes, there's no question about it. This is an epic power metal album with progressive elements. This is music in the same vein as RHAPSODY OF FIRE. The neo-classical touches abound, as do the orchestral interludes, the anthem-like choruses, the usual Latin/Greek intros, the typical dramatic storytelling, the fast, relentless drums and guitars, joined by instruments like the violin or the flute to add to medieval flavor. This is epic power metal.

But rarely have I heard an album that has entertained me as much as "Gaia II: La Voz Dormida". Usually, I complain about music like this when bands release records full of repetitive songs, where it's hard to distinguish when one track ends and when the next one begins. Even a band like RHAPSODY would receive this criticism from time to time. But MAGO DE OZ managed to create a double album of epic metal that never bored me or seemed repetitive to me.

This is accomplished thanks to the balance of quiet and fast tracks, of soft melodic interludes and frantic guitar battles. This is also accomplished by the excellent melodies and hooks that one can find throughout this record. Every little song is memorable in its own way. None of them may be incredibly groundbreaking or original, but all of them are enjoyable, not one is dull or drags for too long. Next to instrumental-only tracks made in Hollywood-music style we can find the epic anthems with sing-along choruses, followed by tender moments for piano and vocals, after which an avalanche of guitar scales befalls, then we encounter passages that take us in a voyage back in time to the Middle Ages, and we're immediately brought back to the present by ferocious cascades of throttling drums. The equilibrium in the album is maintained during more than one hour and a half, which is a truly remarkable feat..

Of course, the excellent musicianship of the band helps a lot. Drummer and lyrical/musical mastermind Txus de Fellatio constantly keeps a breathing pulse, while the bassist provides the grounds necessary to maintain the pressure. All the guitarists (there are a few in here) are terrific, as is Mohamed in the violin and Ponce de Leon on the flute. The vocals are outstanding, very melodic but also powerful. It helps that the lyrics deal with an interesting subject, as is the nefarious influence of religion in history. The band shows conviction while playing tracks to these lyrics.

I can't do anything else but applaud and recognize a band that has managed to surpass the problems intrinsic to the sort of music they play and that has released a double album that I never wanted to end sooner rather than later. Excellent musicianship, excellent melodies, great entertainment value, a lot of music. What else should I ask from a record to award it a good rating?

The T 666 MAGO DE OZ continues to prove me wrong in different ways: on one hand, I used to think of them as a repetitive if-you've-heard-one-song-you've-heard-them-all power metal band, which they clearly aren't, as they add elements of all kinds of music to their sound and create very entertaining power metal songs mixed with folk and even traditional rock n' roll; on the other hand, I used to think they could even be a prog-metal band. Now I'm not so sure.

Jesus de Chamberi is a metal opera, but unlike other works that share this definition, here we only have one singer who tells us of all the details and the events. An adaptation of Jesus Christ's life to the fiery Spain of MAGO DE OZ, the story is interesting, entertaining, irreverent. The music that accompanies it changes style as easily as the main character changed water into wine: from pure power metal to folk metal to bar-rock n' roll in the blink of an eye. Some songs lack any distinctive elements but some manage to shine through ("Hasta que tu muerte nos separe", "El fin del camino", "Jesus de Chamberi").

The album is uneven and the music is rather very traditional in its form. In the end, Jesus de Chamberi is a very enjoyable work that needs no genre to be appreciated. Not as good as their later Gaia, I'll give it 3 stars over 5.

The T 666 THE HUMAN ABSTRACT's first album showed that the band certainly could play, but I found the record very uneven, very decent till song 8, and quite mediocre after it.

It seems lack of balance is a feature inherent to the band's DNA. "Midheaven" has some advantages over its predecessor. Mostly, the band has found some use for their abilities. Whereas in "Nocturne" many instrumental sections just appeared to have been included there for showing-off purposes, everything seems to have a reason now. The crazy guitar scales and drum fills fit the music and sound like they belong here. The band thus sounds a little bit less self-indulgent as a result, which is a good thing in extreme metal. Excesses may sound good in other genres, but in metal extreme metal sometimes they sound like cheap ways of getting attention (the music already is loud, please.)

Some of the weaknesses that this album still has are the lack of balance and the use of "screamo" vocals. Screamo vocals detract from the overall metal picture and make the music sound adolescent and less serious than it is. On another hand, the album, again, starts to lose focus after about halfway through. Curiously, exactly when metal seems to recede in favor or emo/harcore music.

The best song, and the catchiest, is probably "Breathing Life into Devices" It actually makes the vocals seem like a fine addition to the album. And the band displays their abilities without getting in the way of the music.

Again, a 3-star effort that could've been better. I hope next time THE HUMAN ABSTRACT gets it totally right. Anyway, the band is a good alternative in light extreme metal.

The T 666 After the commercial and critical failure of "Virtual XI", IRON MAIDENand vocalist Blaze Bayley mutually decided to part ways. The band didn't take long to announce what many fans viewed as the resurrection for The Beast: Bruce Dickinson, former front man, would be re-taking his spot as lead singer. To add to the miracle, Adrian Smith, last seen on "Seventh Son" (Dickinson's-Maiden last truly great album) was back again, but without any current member leaving, thus making the Irons a three-guitar outfit. The dreaded years of Bayley were over; a new, refreshed, re-vitalized Maiden was going to emerge from the ashes. That's what the fans thought.

And, to a degree, that's what actually happened. Sure, the old Beast was back. With Dickinson at the helm, everything was in place together; the band could once again focus on writing their traditional metal anthems, as now they had a singer whose voice could actually match the power of the instrumental machinery. Gone were the days when Harris had to think twice about how to build each song in a way that would suit their low-ranged singer the best, not to overpower it or create parts that would make it show its deficiencies. Yes, Iron Maiden could once again conquer the skies.

But, as I implied, the thing wasn't exactly a resurrection in qualitative terms but more of a re-birth for the old Maiden. Now with Dickinson holding the microphone, the band actually went back to their old sound. The music that made Maiden famous and loved around the world was here again, but at the expense of the progressive, more melodic arrangements that Bayley's weak voice forced Harris to write for the songs in the two preceding albums. Many of the instrumental and structural discoveries that the group had made in the past were thrown aside in favor of a return to old formulas, not completely, of course, but at least partially.

And that's the reason why I don't see the "resurrection" as such. I think IRON MAIDEN WAS alive in the Bayley-era, as much alive as it was now, in 2000, when they released their first album since Dickinson had returned. As my previous reviews showed, I happen to love both Bayley-fronted albums, so "Brave New World" felt somewhat awkward for me the first time I heard it: it was like if the band I was getting to love suddenly disappeared and the other band I used to adore had came back from the dead. All of a sudden, it was like if from "Fear of the Dark" IRON MAIDEN would had jumped forward straight to this album, bypassing that 1995-1999 era.

Of course, make no mistake: this album is great, leaps ahead of their last decent record with Dickinson and miles ahead of the one before that ("No Prayer"). The music here is in traditional Maiden style but with more complex arrangements, more instrumental parts, but nowhere as many as in "X-Factor" or even "Virtual XI". Individually, there are a few things to notice. First, Harris truly is back at the top of his game, playing as good as ever; Nicko McBrain continues to get better, now even adding double bass drum (?!?) to his arsenal. The guitars, well, now we have three guitarists, each one better than the other, so the album is a solo-fest and a delight for guitar lovers. And Dickinson. I have to say it: I think he has been getting better with the years; age hasn't taken a toll on him. His voice is a powerhouse that's a pleasure to enjoy.

The Wicker Man (10/10) Even if I said that some elements that were typical of the Bayley-era were lost in this album, nothing can ever top the "Dickinson-Maiden" for fast, lightning-fast tracks, and this is probably their best one of all time (not counting "Wasted Years" which is in a slower tempo). A guitar announces the main riff by itself, then the whole machine attacks. Dickinson enters the scene as the powerful star who knows the stage was set for him. After a great pre-chorus, the chorus is superb, with a guitar singing a little innocent melody while McBrain (for the first time ever) uses double bass drum to accentuate the glory of the music. Listening to this track I can understand why many fans saw this as the ultimate in resurrections, as it's magnificent. The solos by the THREE guitarists are fantastic, as is their playing throughout the whole track. As always, an excellent opener, maybe their best ever only after "Sign of the Cross" in "The X_Factor".

Ghost of the Navigator (10/10) The album starts really wonderfully. A great lamentation by a guitar opens this track, much in the vein of the first album of the Bayley-era. Then a crescendo, the intensity grows, and then the main verse, a riff not typical of Maiden. Powerful, imposing, the second section is more melodic, sounding a little like Queensryche but with Maiden written all over it; then a third section in the same tempo but different drumming; then a fourth section, in high speed, Dickinson singing over a playful ride cymbal and a crying guitar. After a repetition, the solo goes through all the speeds, the last one even enhanced by an accurate double-bass drumming by Nicko. A fantastic song, another check-mark for the resurrection list.

Brave New World (9.5/10) A pensive dialogue between guitars opens this song. Very melancholic, Dickinson's great singing helps to set the mood. The music gets more powerful and metallic, with a rhythm that speaks of battle, of struggle, of hope of victory. The chorus is very good, specially as contrast to the previous desperate rhythm. The second time that the verse appears, it would do so in faster speed, but with the same guitars singing in the background. The solo is a great axe-battle for supremacy, with all three contestants coming out as victorious. An excellent Maiden-riff serves as bridge for the last arrival of the chorus. It seems that, after all, this album is really the phoenix bird that Eddie climbed upon to raise above the ashes.

Blood Brothers (9/10) A good beginning, a conversation between all the electric-string instruments. Against a triple rhythm, Dickinson sings a very tuneful melody. After such an unusual prairie-ready moment, the chorus strikes as stormy, as a wake-up call. The tempo doesn't change even in the instrumental section, which features some great melodies and it's the best part of the song, with extensive use of the synth. Another success. Only the not-changing rhythm makes me give it "just" a 9.

The Mercenary (8.5/10) An energetic attack in the form of a riff, a fast track. The second section is very much like the chorus, which sounds like old Maiden, with great guitars beneath the surface. A very good speed-solo by the guitars open the way for the third appearance of the chorus, and the end of this great, if not brilliant, fast song.

Dream of Mirrors (9/10) A weird operatic opening with Dickinson singing over alike guitars. Then a guitar-solo section that seems to come from an Italian western; the mood changes when Dickinson comes back to one of suspense, of tension being built, of anger being saved for later, of water ready to break the levees. Then a short melodic chorus and it starts all over again. Until now McBrain has limited himself to use the hi-hat, now he finally jumps into the scene in full power to provide rhythm for a very QUEENSRYCHE-like chorus (which is logical as Queensryche was, after all, a band prominently influenced by Iron Maiden). The very heroic but slow atmosphere changes when all of a sudden the tempo changes and we're in the middle of a throttling cavalry. Great solos fly like bayonets, the drums pound like horse's legs, and the vocals soar like the battle chants of the warriors. The chorus appears again, and then the song ends. Great song.

The Fallen Angel (8/10) The beginning of this song sounds like old, ancient Maiden, straight from the time of "Powerslave". The chorus sounds just the same, bringing memories of by-gone eras. This enjoyable little track is an exercise in time-traveling, The Beast walking over known-but-forgotten territories again. Good. Nothing else.

The Nomad (9/10) Another track in the vein of "The Clansman" in "Virtual XI" in that it talks about a warrior from a different time. The guitars play great tunes, while the rhythm is like a zigzagging serpent. The chorus has an oriental flavor, but its third appearance is slower, more typical-Maiden. The solos are great, all in that same nomadic-desert-like style. Halfway down we suddenly go back to the brilliant times of THE X FACTOR, with some beautiful guitar melodies over synths and bass. A good song turned into a fantastic one. Excellent.

Out of the Silent Planet (7.5/10) Guitars open this song. When the vocals appear, the music sounds a little like a weird GUNS N'ROSES (?!?). That illusion lasts very short and we enter Maiden realm again. The chorus is good, a powerful chant, even though the verse itself is not that remarkable. When the song gets faster it also gets better. This one sounds like a GOOD track out of "No Prayer for the Dying"(that's almost an oxymoron). It's actually a good song and even though it's the weakest of the album, it's not bad, just not AS good as all the other ones.

The Thin Line Between Love & Hate (8/10) The album was on its way to a perfect rating, so it's up to this track to decide, as the last one was not really a brilliant one. This one starts powerfully, with energy, then a battle-cry of a chorus strikes like a flaming sword. What unfolds is a rather typical Maiden song, with good solos and decent melodies. When we reach the instrumental section, we're a little tired of the music but suddenly the air gets smoother, everything gets calmer, more melodic, the guitars sing like big ladies and the drums mark the rhythm as implacable commanders. Then the music gets quieter again, the great melodies in the guitars are joined by Dickinson who sings a just a few lines but so well that it's as if he said "let me say the last word, I'M BACK". And the album ends.

This has seldom (if ever) happened to me before: I started to write a review with one rating in mind, only to end giving the album a different one (?!?). As I always hear the music while I'm writing, now I've had the chance to realize that, even though the music is not like in the Bayley-era albums and that the sound harkens back to the earlier days of the Beast, the album IS a masterpiece in the Maiden catalogue. I won't change my introductory paragraphs as what I said still applies, specially to the two following albums ("Dance of Death" and "A Matter of Life and Death"), but I have to acknowledge that, in this course of this 70 minutes, I found out I was wrong. The album doesn't deserve a 4. It doesn't deserve a 5, either, as there are a couple of weak tracks; thus, the correct rating is a 4.5. This is my fourth favorite album by Iron Maiden, just below "Somewhere in Time", "X-Factor" and "Seventh Son".

The T 666 DEVIN TOWNSEND has always surprised me with his music. From his industrial experiments with STRAPPING YOUNG LAD to his own more eclectic DEVIN TOWNSEND'S PROJECT to the bizarre stories of "Ziltoid the Omniscient", the man's musical output has been changing constantly while retaining some familiar elements, like the industrial sound and that "wall of sound" that people usually mention in reviews. This time around, Townsend surprises me again, but, curiously, by not surprising me.

Yes, the music in "Ki" is rather... normal, for lack of a better word. The typical psychotic outbursts of the past, the anxiety-driven sounds of previous albums, are all but forgotten in this new release. It's like the musician has calmed down, cooled down a little bit, and decided to write a record of songs that are much more easier to digest by any casual listener. The result is a quite melodic, but rather uninspired effort that has moments of brilliance but never reaches the heights that just the last two albums reached.

The music, more melodic, is also more acoustic, with less industrial elements, and a much bigger emphasis on the singing and the atmosphere. While I usually prefer melody and atmosphere, I'm missing that uniqueness that Townsend's records always had. Some songs in "Ki" sound mundane, going from light metal to grunge to blues without shining in any of these styles nor creating some truly original mix.

That's not to say there's nothing to like on "Ki". The album, actually, it's quite enjoyable and entertaning, maybe more friendly than "Ziltoid The Omnisicient." And Townsend still manages to introduce his little jokes here and there, like the song "Trainfire", a mix of pop and old style rock n' roll complete with Elvis impersonation (and a very decent one, I must say).

This is the strength that the album is missing: that constant change of moods and ideas in the course of one single record is less evident in "Ki." It's like Devin Townsend has reached a more sane mental state, but his music is missing the erratic factor.

A good album nevertheless, worthy of three stars.

The T 666 Too long. That's the first idea that came to my mind while I was looking for a phrase to describe this album by THE GATHERING.

Now, how can an album ever be too long? That would certainly mean that there are set standards that artists and reviewers should follow to create and to judge records. Well, there aren't any. When an album seems too long to a listener, this is an entirely subjective appreciation based on the enjoyment he/she had while listening to the music and his/her perception of the speed at which time passed while doing it. While listening to this double-disc by the once-metal Dutch band, time passed slowly, extremely slowly. I realized that this effect was caused by the endless procession of slow, sedated, repetitive songs that clutter "How to Measure a Planet", my third, and probably my last experience with THE GATHERING.

This appreciation, again, is entirely my own. One can't come to a review and try to find pure objectivity on it, especially when it's written about something so subjective as music and art. There are cases, though, when it's easier to point out the details that should be evident to everyone, both converts and infidels alike. In this case, I have to mention the beautiful voice of Anneke van Giersbergen, clearly the highlight of this pseudo-interesting band. This same music without her voice would be utterly impossible to digest. There are also some good moments of music, and the band is clearly capable of delivering an ambient-atmospheric experience without much effort, but I'd love if they were also capable of writing a good melody or coming up with a really good riff, for a change.

This review may sound extremely negative and quite incongruent with the rating I'll award this record. It is neither. I'm pointing out my qualms about this album, but I'm sure a listener more used to this kind of "relaxing-rock-with-hints-of-metal" will enjoy the experience, even more so considering this is a double-album, a fact that, while tedious for me, will be very rewarding for fans of THE GATHERING. And about the rating, I will give the album a 2.5, because it express what is album is in a better way: a middle-of-the-road record, not harmful, not terrible, but not brilliant either.

The T 666 The progressive-metal genre is full of cloners and terrible bands who confuse technicality with quality. ULYSSES is not one of them.

The music on this release borrows heavily from the progressive-metal giants DREAM THEATER and, more evidently, FATES WARNING. There's a few hints of PAIN OF SALVATION here and there but this is a much more melodic, less violent project. But while the influences are there, ULYSSES have a sound of their own, never turning into one of the dozens of cloners that plague this subgenre.

The songs are all long and with complex structures. ULYSSES does not put a big emphasis in choruses or catchy sections and creates music that takes more than a couple of listens to really appreciate to its fullest. That's not to say that there aren't a few brilliant melodies here and there: this album is actually very melodic. The thing is, the band uses these tunes to build their structures, their musical buildings, instead of making them the sole focus of the tracks.

The musicianship is high in the band, especially in the rhythmic section and in the soloists. The vocalist, though, has an erratic performance. At times very good, at moments it also tends to lose focus and almost sounds like he's singing off-key. His style resembles that of Ray Alder of FATES WARNING with some hints of Daniel Gildenlow. The timbre of his voice reminds us, at times, of the clean vocals of Tomy Joutsen of AMORPHIS.

The music is a little bit on the sad side, and that become more evident after one reads the inspiration the band had for writing the album: a little girl dying at age 1. With all his flaws, the vocalist manages to convey that sadness and that emotion, and the music helps him tell a tale of courage and love.

All in all, this a a very good band that I'll be checking out in the future, for sure. One of the best pure-traditional-progressive metal bands I've heard in the last months,

The T 666 Having previously heard only "Blood Mountain", the MASTODON experience for me was not a fully gratifying one. While I liked the innovation and the energy that the band was capable of, I wasn't too thrilled about the senseless vocals or the lack of melody. Luckily for me, things have changed this time around.

"Crack The Skye" is a whole different beast, much more focused, much more controlled than its predecessor. The band has toned down on the violence a little bit, to leave more room for subtlety, melody and actual songwriting. Yes, the band is still violent, energetic, aggressive, metallic. But now it's much easier to read more than all of that between the lines of the heavy, syncopated riffing.

MASTODON has decided to adopt a much more melodic style. The first and most obvious change is in the vocals. It seems the members of the band finally decided to try to sing and add melodic hooks to their songs. Now we can hear choruses, melodies that stay with us much more immediately than the insane riffs could do in the past. The unique riffing is still here but in a more balanced approach.

The band has also changed its musical style a little. At times the songs sound much more like melodic swedish death metal a la SOILWORK than they ever did in the past, and there are a few moments when we're even reminded of grunge music by the nature of the riffs. Much more groove and style and less attack and destroy, the band seems to be trying to reach out, and maybe it's succeeding on that.

The album is not perfect, some songs are quite subpar when compared withe the best moments in the album, but in general the experience is quite satisfactory, and I can't do anything else but recommend MASTODON's latest to anybody who wants to try some original, modern American metal.

The T 666 EVERGREY's previous album, "Monday Morning Apocalypse", was a complete disaster made of simple 3-minute songs with no good melodies or interesting riffs. Is this newest release, "Torn" any better? The answer is a yes, though not a very enthusiastic one.

Some of the problems that plagued the preceding work have been worked upon this time around. For starters, the songs are slightly longer in average, and they seem to have been given some thought before being recorded. It doesn't sound anymore like they were spur of the moment, as in the atrocious "Monday Morning Apocalypse" which reminded us of bad made-for-MTV metal. The songs in "Torn" sound composed, sound intelligent.

Much of this improvement is due to the better guitar work that we can appreciate. Riffs are much better, much more interesting, original, and powerful. Even though we can't really say that this is the most memorable collection of riffs ever, at least is competent enough for a good metal record. Some are derivative (like the main one in "Fear", which sounds like a mix of DEATH and MORBID ANGEL, bands way heavier and more innovative than EVERGREY).

But the biggest advantage that "Torn" has over its infamous predecessor is that it seems Englund and Co. finally decided to bring back that old, forgotten little detail that music oftentimes has: melody. No, this isn't really sweet or mellow music or anything like that, but this time around we actually can remember some of the choruses, some of the verses, even some of the solos. "Broken Wings" and "Scars" are examples of this.

As always, EVERGREY features some tight musicianship. Englund's skills in the guitar are good enough to deliver a decent performance, and Danhage's are even better. Ekdahl never amazes us but is always efficient, and in "When Kingdoms Fall" his performance behind the drum kit is very precise. Zander, though a very competent keyboardist, is more of an ornament than a true main player in EVERGREY. Rarely have I found a better example of "background keyboards" in a metal band.

And that's probably my biggest problem with this band. It started with promise, reaching its climax with "Recreation Day", and taking its music to a newer level with the almost-excellent "The Inner Truth". But suddenly, Englund dropped all the interesting lyrical themes and it seems the music had to suffer as well. The band really "dumbed-down" its music with "Monday Morning Apocalypse", and even though "Torn" is a step in the right direction, is nowhere, nowhere near the level of their previous releases. Songs are shorter, keyboards are just a gimmick, even Englund's vocals, once regarded as some of the best in metal, have taken a distinct commercial approach, with the singer constantly favoring superfluous adorning techniques instead of delivering a true powerful performance.

Overall, EVERGREY is caught in a place where they don't know what they truly want out of their music. To put this idea in perspective, we can say that, while in "The Inner Truth" and earlier efforts the band sounded a little bit like SYMPHONY X and PAIN OF SALVATION, nowadays what their music reminds us of is of much more direct, Swedish metal bands like SOILWORK or IN FLAMES. It's clear that that's the direction Englund wants for its creature. Sadly, I must say that the music of any of those two bands is far more entertaining and well-crafted than the last two releases by EVERGREY. While those two bands sound like excellent melodic-commercial-death-metal, EVERGREY could just be described as "metal", bluntly, no descriptors, no categories, and not because it's incredibly original, but because it has almost no character at all.

The T 666 This is seriously horrendous.

Being a completionist is sometimes a bad thing, bad for your wallet but also, as in this case, for your ears and mind. I had the two previous EVERGREY albums ("Inner Circle" and "Recreation Day"), then I got "In search of Truth", and when their then-new album hit the shelves, I forgot to read some reviews first as I thought this band was a proven thing. But just before listening to the record for the first time, I read a review in another website that really bashed this album; I got scared, but I kept on believing that, after such quality, powerful metal records as the two preceding this one, it was impossible for a band to fall so low as that review stated it did. Then I listened to the cd; then I did it again; a few weeks after, I tried for the third time, trying to convince myself I was sleepy or something the first two times; but then, I finally gave up. This really is a bad, bad album, almost crappy. Truly.

Where is the Evergrey of such powerful, almost majestic songs like "Recreation Day" or " A touch of blessing" (their best song ever)? Where is the well crafted, multi-layered structures I heard before? Where is the keyboard player?

This album is not good power or progressive metal by any means. It's made up of repetitive, boring, simple, mundane mtv-ready rock songs. Every song in this record is shorter than 4 minutes, with the exception of a couple, which, by the way, are longer not because of interesting, complex solos or instrumental passages but due to dragging, mind-numbing noises or riffs. The riffs in this album are vulgar, there's not even one original riff, not even one. Edlund, a good singer, yells more than sings, but for me the worst aspects of this opus are this three:

-no musical build up to great choruses. Well, there's hardly any chorus you will remember anyway.

-no instrumental passages, no musical textures, nothing interesting.

-no keyboard. Remember, again, "A touch of blessing"? Remember how the little ostinato played in the keys enhanced the main riff of the song's verse? Well, all of that is gone.

The worst part is, there's not a memorable song, not one. The title track happens to be the best (or least bad) maybe only because is the only attempt at writing a decent chorus in the whole cd.

And the lyrics... After dealing with interesting subjects we get things like: "inside out going outside in." Do they think they sound smart by doing that play of words that I've heard 100 times before?

I hoped this was just a slip and not a fall for this talented band. Their previous outing was almost in the threshold of greatness, but I think they tried to get into MTV. Yes, they really thought they could make millions. They even did a photo session dressed like mtv-stars.

In the end is originality what this album lacks the most (besides melodies, choruses, solos, etc). They tried so hard to sound like mainstream hard-rock bands, they forgot what they do well; mainstream bands at least make songs you remember after a while.

Avoid like the plague.

The T 666 How can I, someone who has declared DT one of his favorite bands in all metal, be giving this Greatest Hits compilation a bad rating? A collection of DT's should be every fan's dream, shouldn't it?

There's absolutely NO reason for a fan who has all the albums to have this other than to presume of a perfect collection. And this compilation doesn't add ONE SONG to the catalogue ("To Live Forever"? Please...). This is also not a good introduction to sell the band to people who haven't heard it previously.

Ok, I forgot: we get a couple of remixes here. Well, if you really crave for that new mix where you can listen to the hi-hat one decibel higher than in the album, rush ahead and go buy this collection. The original albums were all pretty well-produced in the first place so there's really no need for new mixes.

- First off, where is "Ytse Jam"? If there's a song that had to be here is that one. Label issues aside, I'm sure it could be done. And they couldn't even have argued that they didn't want any Dominici-sung track in the compilation, as that one is an instrumental. It's awful that there's not ONE song from the band's first album on this record.

- From one of their masterpieces, "Images and Words", they chose, well, their only actual "hit" ("Pull me Under") which makes the title of this album coherent; they chose a great song like "Take the Time", and "Another Day". I love every song in that record. But I just can't forgive that "Metropolis" isn't here. It's just ridiculous. That's one of the seminal DT songs and one which defines their sound for prospective fans.

- From "Awake" they chose "Lie", which had a video but it's not the best track in the album, they chose "Silent Man" and "Lifting Shadows off a Dream". Where's "The Mirror" or, even more, "Erotomania" and "Voices"? Bad selection. If they wanted to spotlight less-known tracks, they could've gone with the great "Scarred" instead.

- "Falling into Infinity" has no better luck. "Peruvian Skies" is good and "Hollow years" is very pretty, but really, for a true taste of DT, where are "Trial of Tears", or the amazing combo "Hell's Kitchen-Lines in the sand"? Terrible picks (these are not bad songs per se, the're just awful as selections for a greatest hits album).

- "Scenes from a Memory" should never be cut. Period. At least they chose some of the greatest moments of an album that doesn't have many weak moments so it isn't so big an achievement.

- "6 Degrees of Inner Turbulence" receives the usual treatment. They don't include fan-favorite "The Glass Prison" (which I don't like at all, but most people do, so probably it would've been a good hook for new fans) and prefer the good "Misunderstood" and the forgettable "Disappear." And again, they cut the only really great part of that album, the title-track, and utterly kill it. They include the "radio edit" of "Solitary Shell". What "radio" are we talking about? Again, if your band isn't mainstream, please include what the fans love, so that newbies can have a better sample of your music. Not a RADIO EDIT that no radio has ever aired anyway.

- "Train of Thought" is butchered as we expected, with the horrendous "As I Am" and the decent "Endless Sacrifice" as choices.

- They did a good job of choosing the songs of "Octavarium." To include the title-track would've been a good idea, but it's a long song. And time had to be saved for...

... wait...

...no, there's no "A Change of Seasons" in any of the two discs!

And yes,there is enough room in the discs to include the legendary 23 minute track.

After I've said that, I guess the rating I'm giving this compilation should come as no surprise.

As compilations go, this is atrocious. If this was an album of new songs, it would be a decent one. But knowing every record of the band, and thinking on what they should've chosen to really attract new fans (which I guess is the objective of compilations -other that making money for the record label, which this collection won't do either-, to give people who don't want to buy 9 albums and one EP a good sample of what the band's music is about), these 2 discs are in my view a waste of time and resources.

You know, for a band that has only ONE radio-"kind-of"-hit ("Pull Me Under"), they should've gone with what their fans love the most, not what the band or the label think are their greatest hits, because this kind of band rarely has ANY HIT, so their real "hits" or the closest to that would be those songs that their fans think are a better sample of DT for newcomers. But DREAM THEATER won't gain any new fans with this horrendous song selection.

The T 666 This album is good, there's little question about it. Is it power metal? progressive metal?

I'll say from the get-go: this is a power metal album, very well-crafted, intelligent, with pianos and very good melodies, plus excellent musicianship of all parts involved.

This is heavy metal crafted after QUEENSRYCHE. If you've ever heard that band's superb "Operation: Mindcrime", then you'll have a decent idea of what this record sounds like. Good riffs, thunderous, empty drums, pianos used not only as background but in some important part of songs, and loud, soaring vocals that overpower anything that dares to defy them.

The music has a certain majestic tone to it. It sounds full of grandeur, full of elegance. Probably, that's why many people called this and other albums by SAVATAGE "progressive metal". After all, the metal genre was not really a darling of the mainstream media, and any kind of metal that sounded elegant or highly-polished must have been "progressive" for some people.

Nevertheless, "Edge of Thorns" is a much more accomplished album than "Hail of the Mountain King" (the previous one I reviewed) and it should be an addition for any metal fan's collection.

The T 666 SAVATAGE's first album to enter my collection was this one, "Hall of the Mountain King". As such, it would be fair to review it first.

A word of attention should be given to anybody wanting to explore this band's output and have seen it categorized as progressive-metal: what we have on this album is good power-metal with some interesting passages that, more in a conceptual way than a musical one, show some hints at progressiveness. By the last tracks of the record the music goes even further backwards in time when it covers NWOBHM territory, sounding very similar to IRON MAIDEN but without the flashy double-guitar work or the mighty riffs and bass lines. A good band to compare SAVATAGE with, at this point of their career, would be QUEENSRYCHE, another group that was hardly progressive musically, but which released a masterpiece of heavy-metal conceptual music ("Operation Mindcrime") and became a legend in the prog-metal subgenre.

Most of the songs are rather typical power-metal ones with some excellent riffs (like the one in the first track, "24 hours ago") and very few quieter sections. In fact, the music is very constant in its features: hardly do we have changes in tempo or time signature in here, with the probable exception of "Legions". SAVATAGE chose to play a metal-version of GRIEG's "In the Hall of The Mountain King" from the "Peer Gynt" suite in the track previous to the title one, "Prelude to Madness." The results are not that brilliant, and I feel the band should have stick to their original music.

The recording is clear but with that cardboard-ish sound of 80's-metal productions. The musicianship is good, especially the guitars which steal the show. The vocalist really tries to emulate Bruce Dickinson at times, but sometimes his voice is uniquely his own. When he reaches the highest registers he's capable of (and in falsetto), his voice sounds a little like LED ZEPPELIN's Robert Plant's.

This album is good and it deserves a chance in a metal-fan's collection. Without great melodies or really memorable songs, this metal record fails to achieve classic status, in my opinion. SAVATAGE would find their place in the prog-metal subgenre later on, but in 1987, their recording was just a good, 3-star album.

The T 666 WINTERSUN's first and only album wears its influences with pride. But it's anyone's guess if the mixing of two different worlds into one sonic experience will please most fans of both power/symphonic metal and death/black metal. On one hand, WINTERSUN sounds a little like a power-metal band, straight from the land of groups like RHAPSODY OF FIRE: fast songs with even faster guitar solos, lots of keyboards and thunderous double-bass drums. The album has a certain epic feel to it that definitely makes the link with power-metal even stronger. But for fans of the genre, a word of caution has to be said: this is not power metal. It has many elements of it, it's been influenced by it, but this is, primarily, something else.

On the other hand, the vocals will immediately tell any listener that this record has a strong connection with black metal, with high-shrieking guttural vocals that reminds us of bands like IMMORTAL. The black-metal-side of the music is definitely even more evident than the power-metal side, as not only the vocals but also the music, with tremolo-picking sections and really heavy passages, takes us directly to Scandinavia. WINTERSUN, being from that part of the world, carries the extreme-cold sound in their veins. A band I was constantly reminded of was a Swedish black-metal band that should've been more famous than it was when it was active, DISSECTION. But for fans of the genre, caution again: the music, dark yet inviting, evil yet heroic, is not really black-metal or even death metal. Add some AMORPHIS and some KALMAH to the mix of ingredients that I've given you and by now you may start to have a clearer idea of what WINTERSUN is and if it may appeal to your taste.

The musicianship is excellent. The album was recorded by just two individuals: Kai Hahto in drums, doing a terrific job, and mastermind Jari Maenpaa on every other instrument, shining in all of them especially in the guitars where he manages to evoke the virtuosism of master-shredders like Luca Turilli.

And it's that ingredient what ultimately makes WINTERSUN an album worth getting and hearing. By combining the good elements of two in-theory very different genres, Jari Maenpaa has created music that should appeal to any prog-metal and metal fan. For those in the extremes, though, this will be harder to swallow, as it will be too-extreme for a power-metal band and too-heroic for an extreme-metal one.

4 stars. I hope we can hear more of Maenpaa's music in the future, as only one album of this good music is not enough.

The T 666 It's amazing that a genre that started with so low standards for musicianship (black metal) has spurred a sub-genre of such an outstanding level of quality. Norwegian black metal was meant to be the most painful experience for the ear, with its high-guttural vocals, its lightning-fast tremolo picking, its deliberately-atrocious recordings, and its inhuman blast beats. But somehow there were a few bands that managed to shine through the chaos with their musicianship, like IMMORTAL or EMPEROR (other outfits like DARKTHRONE or GORGOROTH have managed to shine WITHIN that chaos, but that's another story right now.) And it's from the seed of these bands that other musicians decided to build a whole new thing around the basic ideas of the classics of the genre. Eventually, ENSLAVED evolved into a great progressive-oriented band, Ihsahn from EMPEROR started two side projects, both full of radical, advanced ideas for the genre. Finally, the influence has reached Romania, and has given us one of the most daring yet most true-to-roots progressive-oriented black metal bands around: NEGURA BUNGET.

"Om", the latest opus from NEGURA BUNGET, is much more "black" than many of the albums in this subgenre. We have a little more fast sections here, we get a lot more high-guttural vocals (probably 80% of the disc), and, to add to the "black" flavor, the recording is rawer, less-polished than in other albums. The sound of "Om" at times borders on the unintelligible, very much in the true spirit of traditional Norwegian black metal.

Such a recording would be detrimental in other kinds of music but here, somehow, it works. When NEGURA BUNGET is not blasting away with massive violence, they build enormous walls of sound with texture after texture, using keyboards and instruments like the panpipe to create a truly depressive, dark, ominous atmosphere that really belongs in the most obscure areas of the mind. When the music is not fast, it is slow, very slow, moody, and very sedative. It makes one feel insecure, as the keys the band chooses and the harmonies they prefer are always very effective in producing unrest and utter lack of hope. As with ENSLAVED, but much more so here, the music has a distinct "post metal" sound to it. I would venture myself to say that, were it not for songs like "Inaborat", which has plenty of sections of pure black-metal evilness, this album would very perfectly fit in the same genre as recordings by bands such as AGALLOCH. But in "Om" the healthy diversity of tempos and moods make the experience a completely manageable one.

The individual skills of the members of the band are evident, yet never in-your-face. This is not a band that allows for unnecessary displays of virtuosity. What is more important for NEGURA BUNGET is the sound of the ensemble as a whole, as one big integral unit. One never leaves this album with a very high impression of any particular musician in the band, but one always does with an excellent impression of the art of the group. None shines here except for the band. As with most black metal outfits, the members have chosen not to put in the booklet their real names; instead, they use pseudonyms, fantastic names, probably taken from the black arts or stories of demons and witchcraft. And there's no need to know their individual names. They are one big thing. What we know is that NEGURA BUNGET plays some of the most original type of metal around.

It takes quite a few tries to get a real picture of "Om". The long songs, the instrumental-only passages full of dissonance and perverted noises, the erratic structures and the lack of catchiness don't make for an easy first listen. But after a few sessions the magic of the album starts to become apparent, till in the end it is a devastating, definitive fact.

A masterpiece of progressive-oriented black-metal, I give it 4.5 stars. Get "Om". Now. And be ready to immerse yourself into a magnificent world of dark, evil music.

The T 666 AMORPHIS’ music has been with me for more than 14 years. Of all my favorite bands, it is among the first ones I ever met, back in 1995, when, trying to become a metalhead with a friend, I bought a double-disc set called "Death III: Is Just The Beginning", a compilation of artists by the Nuclear Blast and Relapse labels, with more than 30 bands belonging to all kinds of extreme-metal genres. Most of the songs left a bit to be desired, but number 2, “Forgotten Sunrise”, by a Finnish band with a strange name, immediately captivated me with its melancholy, its melody, its cold, icy sound. A few years later, in an MTV program (of all places), I had the opportunity to watch the video for a new song by the same band, called “Against Widows”, which sounded less death, with a singer who added depth and melody to the group’s music. It was just a matter of time. I bought the album, “Elegy”, in Europe, and I became a diehard fan of AMORPHIS’ music. Since then, the band has become one of my favorites, probably only below one or two other artists in my ranking of preferences.

Right from the start, the magic of AMORPHIS for me was found in the cold, nostalgic character of their music, in the skillful mixture of death metal with folk melodies and rhythms from their native Finland, in the heavily-melodic riffs, in the balance between low, deep death growling and the clean, frozen vocals of Pasi Koskinen; the devil and the god of harvest in one single chant. With “Tuonela”, AMORPHIS added psychedelic elements to their music, with sad pianos and PINK-FLOYD/HAWKWIND-esque guitar arpeggios, making their sound feel cold, glacial, like if it had come from times when the thousand lakes and the green forests were populated by just a handful of simple, joyful people, and at the same time from the depth of caves where they dwelled spirits and demons closer to hell.

While most melodic death metal were getting closer to metalcore or adapted their sound to the times with more alternative versions of their music, AMORPHIS firmly continued with their glacial style, taking an extra step away from death metal with every album. Eventually, Pasi Koskinen left the band, which quickly hired Tomi Joutsen to replace him. I had serious doubts about the future of the group with this new “clean” vocalist. Soon enough, the Finnish proved me they wanted to keep on going, with their promising, if very irregular, “Eclipse”, where the voice of the new singer showed itself as more versatile, better trained, yet a little less unique. “Silent Waters”displayed better conecction between the musicians and the singer, with a slight return to the dark melodies and the death metal of the past. Finally, at last, Joutsen has become an essential part of AMORPHIS’ sound, joining Holopainen, Koivussari and Kallio, forming an inseparable entity, in the band’s most recent full-length, “Skyforger.”

From the beginning, AMORPHIS announces a return to the glories of the past. “Sampo” starts with a beautiful piano riff, melodic like no other, which transports me, flying over Nordic regions of cold weather but warm hearts. Joutsen’s vocals are the air current upon which be float like on a flying carpet. Halfway through the song, Joutsen and the piano get a chance to have a private dialogue, and we are privileged to be in attendance. Near the end, the music gets heavier, menacing; Joutsen growls gravely, evilly; it sounds like the demon of the forests threatening to disturb the peace of the bucolic village of the thousand and one lakes. The triumphant chant returns at the end, to remind us of the victory that the pure, the vital, always has in AMORPHIS’ music.

Without pause, “Silver Bride” starts, fast, with a melody and a structure that reminds me of the very successful “House of Sleep” from “Eclipse”, with a chorus almost as catchy. “From the heaven of my heart” starts with a delicate piano monologue. The music brings me back to the distant times of “Elegy”, and Joutsen’s first appearance takes my mind to the fantastic “Tuonela.” Joutsen shows he’s a multi-faceted vocalist: at times almost innocent, sad, resigned; at times energetic, rebel, young; and at times he even shows a third face, that of a demon trapped inside a man’s body when he growls in death metal style.

The beginning of “Sky is Mine” almost leaves me static, as I could heard the same kind of psychedelic arpeggio that opened, 11 years ago, “The Way” in “Tuonela.” This song is beautiful, intriguing. The return to the past is even more evident when “Majestic beast” strikes, a monster with a heavy riff and the bestial infernal voice of Joutsen, in a flashback to the melodic death metal of “Greed” in Tuonela. Like on the rest of the album, the work of the guitars in the chorus is brilliant, one playing upon the other, without ever repeating each other.

“My Sun” kicks off with a rather limited melody, but the harmonic work by Holopainen and Koivussari in the verse sets nostalgia afire, and the longing chorus just puts more air into the flame. “Highest Star” has a flute playing around over guitar arpeggios, making me think of a little village, a cold and beautiful world. The chorus is one of the weakest in the album.

Next, the title-track starts with the acoustic guitar and the piano evidently trying to cast a spell upon us. The music grows, becomes more earthly, desperate. AMORPHIS goes back to the pre-choruses left behind after “Am Universum.” “Course of fate” sounds like the last chant, the end of the journey, with a stubborn rhythm and a positive tone. Finally, “From Earth I Rose” starts with a riff that makes my blood freeze, taking me straight to the boiling ice blocks from “Elegy”, to the time when I became a disciple of Finland’s own magicians. The entire song feels like a comeback, even the lyrics where the union between man and land is obvious, celebrated. This melancholic, dark death metal, mixed with rustic, magical folklore, closes the disc.

“Skyforger” is a voyage over all of AMORPHIS previous stages; it goes over the psychedelic experiments of “Am Universum”, it ventures into the simple, direct terrains of “Far Off The Sun”, it flies over the irregular mountains of “Eclipse” and gives light to the dark caverns of “Silent Waters”. Just for a few moments it even takes us back to the somber deserts full of water and bad weed of “Tales From The Thousand Lakes.” But, most importantly, at times it manages to get close to the bright luminosity of the band’s two masterworks, “Elegy” and “Tuonela.” And, if only for that little fact, the album can’t be but doubly recommended. Though it is not as perfect as those albums, “Skyforger” easily claims the number three spot in a list of the best recordings of the legendary Finnish band.

From “The Karelian Ishtmus” to the present album, AMORPHIS have never really disappointed me. It’s probably the one band I have the most affection for. I cannot but thank them for giving me this fantastic collection of songs about earth, land, and men.

The T 666 For me, ENSLAVED's Mardraum honors its title, becoming a nightmare after just a few listens.

I enjoy black metal, a lot. I enjoyed ENSLAVED's most recent albums, which departed from the pure-black metal sound in favor of more progressive approaches. I even liked ENSLAVED's first, "Vikingligr Veldi", and the second, "Frost." It's actually how far removed this album is from the black metal sound of the band's past what I can't manage to enjoy. The band started to develop into something more after "Frost", something different, and we all know that work has rendered great fruits in the Norwegian's most recent records. But I think "Mardraum" was a slight bump in an otherwise smooth road to musical brilliance.

"Mardraum" avoids atmosphere and darkness and casts aside typical black elements like nostalgia and tremolo riffs and adopts a more death/thrash metal-oriented style more in the vein of 80's bands like KREATOR. The problem is, the music sounds uninspired, lacking in ideas. The band sounds like a hybrid between those 80's bands and more norsecore-oriented black metal artists like MARDUK. But while the latter Swedish manage to make their music attractive even amidst all the violence and noise, the Norwegians of ENSLAVED fail completely, delivering an endless procession of uninteresting riffs with little subtlety, atmosphere, or any hint of good musicianship.

ENSLAVED has never been a band that shines in violence. They shine in creating more atmospheric, epic black metal with progressive tendencies. This is proven here in MARDRAUM, an album that even lacks that semi-epic factor that informed most of the band's viking-metal's past.

The T 666 Well, it had to happen. Eventually, after so many successful albums, IRON MAIDEN had to fail at least once. They did precisely that with 1990's "No Prayer for the Dying."

First, the obvious: this is the first album that doesn't feature Adrian Smith on guitars since he joined the band back in 1981 for the release of "Killers." His replacement: long-time Bruce Dickinson collaborator Janick Gers. Though there is a coincidence in the decline of quality in Maiden's music with the departure of Smith (or arrival of Gers), it's just unfair to criticize the new axe-man and blame him for the weak musical results. It's necessary to point out that not one of the tracks in this record is written by Gers (he would start collaborating more in the next album), and also that Smith wasn't really the main composer in the earlier, better releases. The main composer in The Beast has always been Steve Harris, so if there's someone to point our fingers at about the lackluster tracks, it's him. Gers is just as virtuoso as Smith was, and the fingers of the former match the speed of those of the latter.

The main fault with this album is that suddenly it seemed like Maiden wanted to return to the more direct, quick, pure-metal way of the past, but they just failed completely. All the songs in this album are of an average length, not even one reaching 6 minutes. That by itself wouldn't be a big deal; after all, many of this band's best tracks don't reach that mark either. But the thing is that in those short minutes we don't get enough variation, enough memorable solos or melodies, enough greatness. Maiden also decided to let the more complex approach of the preceding albums out of the picture, in favor of simpler structures, simpler rhythms, simple instrumentations.

To add to the weak impression this album leaves in the fan, there's not one memorable song. Even the singles are rather mundane, rather bland. There's not one chorus that makes us want to chant along, not one solo that makes us want to play air-guitar with our fingers. Even the most advanced track, "Mother Russia", lacks a chorus and lacks memorable melodies. Where The Beast was hiding when recording this album, we don't know.

Tailgunner (7/10) One of the best, if not the best track in the album, it starts with concentrated energy ready to explode. The main riff is good, and the chorus is also good, if not incredibly memorable. It gets a little annoying when they go up in key. A good opener, the tradition hasn't been broken even in this weakest of all Maiden's albums. It's not brilliant, though.

Holy Smoke (6/10) One of the most popular tracks in this album, it starts well enough, with a decent melody, but then it turns into a rather monotonous hard rock track, with a chorus that is hardly discernable from the main verse. Not a bad song, but nothing up to the level of the best Maiden songs.

No Prayer For The Dying (8/10) This one begins more auspiciously, with a dialogue between the guitars and the bass, a good melody and good singing by Dickinson. We even have one of those legendary double-guitar melodies after the verse, and a very good performance by Harris whose bass has a predominant place in the mix. The fast section unfolds later, with the usual characteristics: good solos, fast drumming, breathless atmosphere. The song is very good, the best in the album, but it feels so. brief. It's like Maiden wanted to write one of their short epics but then decided to finish it off quickly. It's like a condensed version of other tracks in this style. But the highlight of the album nevertheless.

Public Enema Number One (7/10) Another song that starts with promise. A good melodic riff leads the way for a direct verse. Then the chorus comes in and doesn't disappoint. The thing is that it comes too quickly, and that's one of the issues I have with this album: the structures have been stripped to the bones, no pre-choruses, no long verses, everything condensed. A good song, nothing incredible. Up to this point, the album is good, if not really great.

Fates Warning (5.5/10) A slow start with some guitar synth makes us believe we're still in earlier eras. Then the main riff attacks and it's much faster but not bad. Then the chorus is just weak, with no hooks. The whole song seems like a continuous single riff. Iron Maiden wrote many better fast songs. Not awful, just weak. The middle section saves it from a lower rating.

The Assassin (6/10) An interesting start with the same rhythm as in "The Clairvoyant" from "Seventh Son of a Seventh Son"but without the instant-classic melody. Good nevertheless, this song is a little awkward, I don't know what to make of it. It has some good things going for it, but then the chorus is not that great and some riffs sound too similar to other riffs in Maiden's and other bands' history. It's too short and near the end it gets almost incoherent. It lacks a good structure, the parts are not that bad but the joining-them-together work wasn't that precise.

Run Silent Run Deep (5.5/10) This may be one of the most mediocre songs by The Beast. It's not really bad, it's just plain, AVERAGE. I can't remember anything interesting about it, I can't even remember a bad thing about it. Maiden-by-the-book, that's what this track is. A formula used again with no added components. One of the riffs sounds very similar to the ending riff in Deep Purple's "Perfect Strangers", just before a very good solo brings the rating of this song a little bit higher.

Hooks In You (3/10) This track has the "merit" of being the first track by Maiden that deserves an "atrocious" adjective from me. It's just awful. There's no melodies, no good solos, no chorus, everything sounds the same, Dickinson sounds extremely annoying, it's just a poor hard-rock song that it manages, by itself, to bring the whole rating of the album down a notch. Maiden can't be allowed to deliver this kind of. thing.

Bring Your Daughter... To The Slaughter (4.5/10) This is the most famous track in the album, but for me is one of the most boring. A Dickinson-solo original song, I don't know why it was included here, much less why it was chosen as the second single, and even less why it was kind of successful. An average hard-rock track with no Maiden attributes, one of the few where Dickinson actually manages to get on my nerves. Not good, just not good.

Mother Russia (7.5/10) The opening of this track is almost spectacular, there's hope that we would get another classic here. Atmosphere, drama, Russian scent, we're in for a ride. The main riff is good and so is the rhythm. The only problem is that this is all that this song is about. There's no chorus, and such a song needed a chorus, even the subject itself cries for one of those anthemic chants by The Beast. Near the end the instrumental section is very good, though very brief. This track feels like if Maiden couldn't afford the studio much longer, so they had to rush the conclusion. It feels like a 7-8 minute track that was seriously cut due to unknown reasons. It's good, but it could've been really great.

As it's easy to see from the rating I've given to the songs, I don't think this album is incredibly atrocious or anything, just a very average, weak effort. As an Iron Maiden album, I have to say it's good only for fans and collectors. The average non-completionist Maiden fan has a lot of albums to buy before getting to this one. Maybe prayer can save this dying album. While not atrocious, this is without doubt the Worst of the Beast.

The T 666 It's obvious that the word "music" doesn't have the same meaning for everybody.

For some, music is just the art of making sounds and recording them, arranged in such a way that the results can be called "songs", "pieces", or whatever term that fits.

For me, music has always been about more than just sounds: it's been about using those sounds to create melodies (though music with no melody can still be good), about using those melodies to create phrases (though simpler music can also be good), about playing with those phrases and ideas to create a structure (though shape-less music does exist and sometimes of high quality), and about making that structure coherent enough as to create a song (or an instrumental piece for that matter). Once this is achieved, the other part of the music experience comes from hearing how each artist chooses to do that, how each musician puts a note, a melody on top of another and how that juxtaposition actually sounds, or harmony. If the artist chooses to put a melody on top of another different one, then I admire the counterpoint work. Of course, all of these has to have a rhythm, has to be played in a tempo, in a speed. Finally, music, for me, has to change within a single song or piece: the themes or melodies can't stay untouched; some variation has to be present. Repetition makes music coherent, it helps the brain predict what will happen and judge in retrospective, but over-repetition can make music a boring, painful experience to follow.

After saying that, it's even more evident that every person has its own particular way of understanding music, because for me, what I get in KAYO DOT's "Dowsing Anemone with Copper Tongue" isn't good music, but just a pile of experimental waste.

This album has receive widespread acclaim in some circles. I will not use the word "overrated" because the term implies a "I'm right, you're wrong" meaning to it; so I will say that I just don't like what I hear and I can't join the fuzz. Maybe I'm wrong, maybe I'm getting left behind by the train of time, maybe what I cherish is dinosaur-metal. Maybe... But I'm glad I'm still able to make the difference that works for me: this is not good. Period. If this is the metal of the future, well, no wonder I'm feeling a little bit sad about it.

I have to make this clear: it's not that there isn't anything worthy of mention in KAYO DOT's album; sure, there are some moments here and there during which my brain actually felt like if good music was coming to it through my ears; the drummer is quite capable; I can't say that this music is not original, for it certainly is, it's unique, I'll admit that. But, is it good? The album has 5 songs: of those, one I sort of accept, even like; two are forgettable, two are just too much for me to handle. And the biggest problem for me is that those two unbearable songs actually amount to half the record's total length.

Gemini Becoming The Tripod (6/10), at least this song is short (short by this band's standards, that is, for its actual duration is almost 10 minutes) so it doesn't get too boring. I have to say it also has a couple elements of interest. It starts quietly, slowly; it immediately goes into full-fledged "sludge" mode, but with some interesting harmonies here and there. The first thing that turns me off with this track is when the vocals appear: the singer sounds like RADIOHEAD's Thom Yorke but after a large dose of... something; he screams, yells, his voice is a series of laments, cries; is he actually in pain? This kind of singing is over-self-indulgence at his most annoying, because I really can't find any musical sense into it, just a desire to set the listener in the same mood as the band: STONED. And maybe that's the key! Toby Driver, KAYO DOT's mastermind, knew that this music was better enjoyed with the brain a little bit off-touch with reality. The torture-session with the singer reaches an end when, suddenly, the guitars start playing a heavy riff; it's a good moment, because it's probably one of the scarce moments throughout the album that are performed at a different tempo. All in all, not an atrocious track, but nothing that makes me hold high hopes for the remainder of this opus.

Immortelle And Paper Caravelle (5/10), mmmm, incredible, another very quiet, almost impossible-to-hear start! The guitar work consists of a few very high notes over a weird effect. When the bass comes into the mix, the music begins to take shape. The low, quiet mood gets a makeover when finally the singer comes back from wherever the last song sent him. He actually SINGS here, in that usual narcotic tone that these musicians seem to love. The trumpet gives us hope that this song will be good. Sadly, silence strikes again (I have to say that if we were to add all the minutes of silence on this disc, we would easily have a medium-length track only made of... SILENCE - John Cage's dream this would be). The quiet mood is with us again. The guitars are joined by violins, playing falling series of notes that sound like the last gasps of a dying man. Then the song ends. And we didn't know what the heck just happened.

Aura On An Asylum Wall (8.5/10)unbelievably, this track starts LOUD. Vocals over drums, with some trumpet accents for effect hit us with a force I couldn't believe. Then, the incredible: music! The trumpet plays a solo! Over piano and very frenetic drums, the brass player is doing what we bought this cd for. The mood of the song is like some dark-jazz-blues, it feels good, we start to believe. Yes, this track is good, almost very good. At the end we have some speed, some virtuosism. It still doesn't have an easy-to-grasp structure but the good playing makes up for it. But it's the last moment of relief we will get.

On Limpid Form (1/10), we start, how else could it be, quietly, like a whisper. The indulgent vocals come back. We cannot believe what we hear next: a chorus, more than one human voice at the same time! This starts so well, it seems this is going to be THE song, the song that finally shows me why this album has been eventually heralded as a masterpiece. We are about 3 minutes into the song and everything is going just fine. Then we arrive to the fourth minute; the intensity starts to wear down. What we're hearing is still worthy of attention, but it could lose us if it doesn't change quickly; minute 5 strikes and the tragedy has started to unfold: silence, some chords accented by snare and cymbals; silence; some chords, some snare, some tom-toms, cymbals; and we go on and on in the same direction. We check the clock: the song lasts 18 MINUTES! It's a sure bet that it will eventually switch to a different mood... but then, we keep on listening, and NOTHING HAPPENS. And thus we wait till, finally the end of the song arrives, and NOTHING EVER HAPPENED. The same thing played till exhaustion for more than 14 minutes!! I did a sort of experiment the third time I listen to this: at about the 6 minute mark, I went to do something, came back two minutes later, and it felt like I had never left; I did the same thing a few minutes later, came back, and again, like if I had never left! Now, I would like that to happen when I'm watching some sport, my team is winning, I have to go the bathroom but I come back and the score remains exactly the same; but I don't want that in my music, I don't want to be sold the idea that 14-minute repetition is talent. Is it? True avant-garde composers have tried things like these but with much more subtlety and richness of ideas and orchestration. Mr Driver tries to emulate something that he just can't. This song just bores me. All that was good about this track got completely lost in my mind, all I could remember was the 14-MINUTE-LONG NOISE.

For me, that would serve as the best possible explanation of the term "pretentiousness": a musician pretending us to sit through 14 minutes of mindless jamming, of stoned-jamming. Somebody could point out that there's actually a lot of invention going on, that it is a work of genius how they play over and over the same pattern just adding a few percussion effects here and there... I could accept that, if there was a melody repeated till death, like some kind of "Bolero" (how insulting I am by mentioning Ravel's exercise in orchestration in the same review where I'm talking about this waste). Or if the harmonies were so darn interesting that we wouldn't feel like we're being sold the same idea for over a quarter of an hour. But no, it's just noise, glorified noise.

Amaranth The Peddler (1/10), only cymbals played with brushes signal the start of the final song. Some dissonant chords in piano, some violin. You know, this was much more interesting when it was done more than 50 years ago by true composers like Gyorgy Lygeti. This is just a band of rockers trying to impress us with direction-less noise. When the vocals and the drums make their appearance, we're already too scared of the final outcome of the song, as we see that it lasts 14 minutes. Of course, KAYO DOT won't let us down, so they do what they do best: repeat some noise until our ears are fooled into believing we are not hearing music but just the sounds of the environment. Then, at last, the albums fades away.

This is my take on this album. I know some people won't agree with me, but that's the great thing about the internet: you don't have to, and neither have I to agree with other reviews. We can make comments about our music, whether they go with the flow or not. And my position is, this is just self-indulgence and pretentiousness, musical arrogance and narcissism, played till death, an ego overblown to the limit. No melodies, no themes, no songs, just a bunch of guys that, I give you that, seem like they know how to play their instruments, making us believe that their jamming has a meaning, that their jamming is art. For a few minutes, the music actually becomes that: musical. But those moments are few and far between. What we got here the most is silences, repetition, noise, boredom. This is not avant-garde. this doesn't defy anything, this is just glorified drug-induced noise (yes, the ego can also be a drug), played by capable musicians who seem like they could create songs, but sadly they chose not to.

Incredible, where I thought I would find some of the most advanced rock music, turned out to be the place where I most definitely didn't.

Some people, when the album was first released, categorized the music as post-metal. Post-metal? Post-rock? For me, the status of music after hearing this thing is, well, post-mortem.

(More than half the disc amount to nothing. For the good moments of the first tracks, I think a 1.5 star rating is more than enough. They just killed any momentum they had going.)

The T 666 A chord lost in space, a cry for attention, a quick descent into a cold, icy forest where all the leaves are frozen and the ground is white because of the snow, almost total lack of visibility, the only thing guiding us is our soul, our will. Out of nowhere little specks of light illuminate the road, letting us see where we are: a deep, hidden lake under a starry, foggy night, surrounded by the minute spirits of the dead. Thus starts AMORPHIS’ masterpiece, the follow-up to the magnificent “Elegy”, one of my favorite albums in all metal.

This very atmospheric beginning of “The Way” leads the way into one of the most rewarding experiences in metal: an album so full of atmosphere and magic that every time I hear it I find myself more totally represented by the music. I lose myself in this imaginary realm of isolation and sadness because I’m allowed to; because there’s no danger this state will become permanent. It’s only music after all. It works as some kind of depressive catharsis necessary to let the downer feelings live, to express themselves. Longing, melancholy, those are emotions as valid as happiness and joy. We can’t always block them out. There are outlets for them. This music is mine. This particular album is my own personal couch where I let the pessimist take over with a hint of hope, because in all the sorrow, there’s art, which couldn’t be a better signal of a future. This is “Tuonela”, for me, a descent into loneliness that I make willfully. And, curiously, many times not alone.

On a less abstract perspective, “Tuonela” was my second AMORPHIS album and it definitely marked the beginning of my life as a metalhead. If SEPULTURA’s “Chaos AD” had been my introduction and AMORPHIS’ own “Elegy” my confirmation, “Tuonela” signaled the point after which I became not only a fan of 5 metal bands but a lover of the genre as a whole, including most of its variations. Also, as the album contains enough progressive elements to be even categorized as “proggy” metal, it helped cement my relation with which would become my favorite metal subgenre.

I have described, with probably little objectivity and skills, the beginning of the atmospheric, fantastic first song. The PINK FLOYD-ish/HAWKWIND-ish guitar makes that song feel like it belongs to another era, a strange time when metal and psychedelic rock walked hand in hand. “Morning Star” has a much harder approach, with a simple yet attractive riff informing the song. As all tracks in “Tuonela”, this one has been thoroughly worked, with verse, pre-chorus and chorus sections, with instrumental short passages to link the singing parts together, all with AMORPHIS’ spacey/cavernous keyboards and guitars which sound like nobody else. This is pure Scandinavian metal of the highest quality. “Nightfall” is a sinuous song that brings back memories of “Elegy” in its folkish spirit. Pasi Koskinen’s amazingly original, frozen vocals fit the music perfectly.

The next song is one of my dearest in all the metal literature, the magnificent title-track. The start couldn’t be more sorrowful, the lyrics talk of tears and sadness and we can’t help but join the ordeal. But there’s a cry of anguish in the chorus, a cry of desperation, almost devoid of optimism, seeing a bleak, death future that leads into the caverns of Hades, the underworld. The melody is superb, but it’s the atmosphere what really makes this song, this and Koskinen’s below-zero vocals which convey all emotions perfectly. By the end of the tragedy, there’s angry resignation, and a beautiful saxophone melody over simple piano chords marks the end of the road, an ironic beautiful entry into the ugliest possible place. Without pause, we’re sent straight into hell. An oriental-flavored riff welcomes us to the fires. The snow is disappearing, the ice melting, and Koiuvassari’s outstanding death vocals pretty much impersonate the devil himself, in the only really important appearance of growling in the entire record. “Greed” is the sin most of the people in hell are there for, and this track certainly makes that relationship clear. The song gets more violent, pure Scandinavian melodic death metal here. The track ends and recedes to make way for magic. Little sound details like glimmers of pocket-sized stars here and there introduce us to the next song, “Divinity”, which marks a stark contrast, with its quite-more-optimistic chorus that somehow tries to recover from the early defeat. It’s still resignation, but a less dark one. All is not lost.

“Shining” is ambiguous. The chorus, full of light and positive energies, seems out of place in the middle of this depressively-beautiful record. This is a more straight-forward hard rock track. “Withered” returns to the AMORPHIS of yore, the one singing over the Finnish prairies about long-forgotten peoples, the one of “Elegy”. “Rusty Moon” enlists the help of a flute playing a nice little figure to make the bond with ritualistic nature of this song ever more evident. The album ends, appropriately, with “Summer’s End”, another fantastic moment of resignation and despair. We feel how time is leaving us behind. We walk with it, but at every step we give, we’re older. Like music, which dies the very moment it’s brought to life. We’re but temporary inhabitants of this leased place. We’ll fade to gray as summer does, as the song does. Summer will return, we won’t.

This album and “Elegy” were enough to make AMORPHIS one of my absolute favorite bands in all popular music. The follow-ups to “Tuonela” were good, great, or even excellent, but the magic, the heights the band reached with these two records have never been equaled since. The band never quite made up their minds whether they wanted to return to their folkish brand of death metal or continue down the atmospheric, semi-progressive path. Anyway, “Tuonela” is a masterpiece of melodic atmospheric pseudo-death metal, an album that, like “Elegy”, reeks of emotions that we won’t want to share at first, but which we will be happy to suffer in the end.

The T 666 I was afraid I was not going to like GOJIRA after reading a few comments about the kind of music the band makes. I'm happy to say I was pleasantly surprised.

GOJIRA plays aggressive, very original metal. While it's difficult to assign a label to the music the band creates, I'm quite comfortable calling it a blend of death metal with some technical elements and some minor metalcore influence.

The songs are mostly completely riff-driven, which is probably one of GOJIRA's strongest points: they really are a riff machine, creating original rhythmic attacks for almost every one of their songs, which differentiates the band from other acts: their songs never sound the same, it's easy to tell one song from the other thanks to the brilliance of the riffs and the somewhat surprising presence of melody in the tracks.

Yes, GOJIRA leaves some room for melody in their music. Not really mellow, subtle melody, but phrases of enough tuneful significance that make every one of their songs memorable enough in the mind of the listener. The vocals, while not perfect (and my minor gripe with the band), are very effective, and manage to convey feeling and emotions, something usually difficult for death metal voices.

GOJIRA makes songs, they take time to make coherent propositions using aggressive means. The riff, the DNA this music is made of, is not piled one upon the other but it is given time to grow, to be effective, to endure. While at times it reminds us of Sweden-style Gothenburg melodic death metal, at times it takes us to the most extreme examples of today's metal bands. Some riffs even sound positively dark and fantastic in their eclecticness, like the one that informs "Esoteric Surgery", a song that tastes like black metal, has a riff of pure black metal inspiration, but feels like a mix between death metal and something from even further down the planet's crust. One of the highlights in the album, as well as "Wolf down the earth".

The album is not perfect and at moments, especially around the middle, tends to lose a little bit of interest, only to regain it again near the end. A great record by a talented band that has surprised me and probably will amaze any metal fan with an open mind.

The T 666 This is a compilation. I feel I have to give some advice to those who haven't heard anything from SHADOW GALLERY and who think that this Greatest Hits could be a good alternative and decent overview of the band's career.

I'm not going to do a track-by-track as I'm not reviewing the music itself but the quality of the compilation. So let me just say how well I think each album is represented in "Prime Cuts".

"Shadow Gallery" (debut):

Represented by two tracks ("The Final Hour" and "Say Goodbye To The Morning"). If there was a big problem with Shadow Gallery's first album was the sound, which was nothing short of atrocious, one of the worst-sounding albums ever in the non-underground progressive-metal world. Both are two of the better tracks in the debut, but there are two others who could've been here: "The Dance of Fools" and "The Queen of the City of Ice" (maybe too long for a compilation).

3/5

"Carved in Stone":

A much better album than the debut, is represented by two tracks here, "Deeper Than Life" and "Don't Ever Cry, Just Remember". While the two are worthwhile tracks, (specially the second one), I don't see any excuse for excluding the best song in the sophomore record: "Cliffhanger". Also, the excellent "Ghost Ship" and the somewhat-saccharine but full-of-melody "Crystalline Dream", with its infectious chorus, should've been here. The omission of "Cliffhanger", though, is enough to make one consider twice about buying this compilation.

2/5

"Tyranny":

SHADOW GALLERY's masterpiece has a special place in my mind and heart, as one of my favorite metal albums ever. That's reason enough for me to pay special attention to how well the peak of SG's career is represented here. In few words: there's NO way to make justice to this album by cutting it in songs; the record is a masterpiece when listened as a complete conceptual work, even though the tracks, all of them, are outstanding prog-metal achievements by themselves. We have 4 tracks out of "Tyranny" in "Prime Cuts": the excellent "Mystery" (great selection), the melodic "Hope for Us", the haunting "New World Order" and probably the least memorable track in the conceptual masterpiece, "Ghost of a Chance". I don't know why they included this one. But the biggest crime has been comitted when the best songs have been left aside: where's "Stiletto in The Sand"? Where's the incredible "Roads of Thunder"? And the band's best-ever song is the one we miss the most: "I Believe", a track with probably the best chorus ever in any song. My opinion: they did a weak, bad job at choosing tracks out of "Tyranny."

1/5

"Legacy":

A terrific album, a good follow-up to the masterpiece. There are only 6 tracks in LEGACY, but another felony has been commited here. If "Cliffhanger" was not included, why couldn't they include "Cliffhanger 2" in its entirety? They chose to edit the song and cut it in half, leaving the best part in limbo and giving us only the second part. Awful idea. Also, "Colors" only lasts 7 minutes in the original album, but they chose to edit it? Why? At least "Legacy" was included. The selection wouldn't have been so bad if they had included the first track in all its 13-minute glory. Just for that, I have to say the work of a butcher seems to have taken place.

1/5

"Room V", "Digital Ghosts":

Well, the first album was released by InsideOut records so it was impossible to add any tracks out of it in this Magna Carta compilation.

0/5 (or maybe not/applicable?)

There's also a demo out of the "Carved in Stone" era included here. But one demo won't make any collection worth your money, if everything else is not what it should be.

If you really have to buy only one album by SHADOW GALLERY, get "Tyranny." Or "Room V". Or "Legacy." They're better than this compilation.

If you can afford more than once cd, there's even less of an excuse to waste your money in this atrocious collection of one of prog-metal's best bands' songs.

I just can't find a reason to recommend this one to anyone, specially considering that "Tyranny" will probably cost the same (or less) and it's the masterpiece of the band, better than all of this songs put together.

The music would get a 5 or a 4. But as a compilation, this gets a 1.