Blaze Bayley

The thing is with Blaze, compared to Bruce, is that there's less expectation with a new Blaze Bayley album.

So you can sort of listen to a new single expecting a nice song, rather than being blown away by it. That's where we've all found ourself with The Mandrake Project, expecting a metal masterpiece and then inevitably being disappointed.
 
Got like halfway through on the way to work - liked the songs, hard to say anything more after half a listen. Nothing mindblowing though, hope there are some classics towards the end of the album.
 
After a couple of listens, the album is nice, full of catchy Maiden-esque melodies (which is great), Blaze's typical solo style and his vocals are good. As expected, the riffs and solos are cool. I don't think as a whole this album is better than the previous one and I don't think I'll be a fan of it. I thought Blaze would do something a little different with 2 guitars, the material sound samey, which isn't good for me. The songs are short and enjoyable.

Highlights: ''Mind Reader'', ''The Year Beyond This Year'' (probably the best song on the album), ''Ghost In The Bottle'' (great riff) and the title track.
''Until We Meet Again'' should be noted too, while ''The Path Of The Righteous Man'' sounds classic metal. These are the songs that shine overall for me.

As for the other songs:

''Tears In Rage'' - cool riff, melodies and solo.
''Rage'' - great intro, nice verses and melodies.
''The Broken Man'' - nice TXF-esque ballad chords and good slow solo.
''Absence'' - great metal riff and melody.
''A Day Of Reckoning'' - nice different pre-chorus, chorus and melodies.
 
I'm digging this one but I agree, the auto-tuned vocals are a turn off. And I kinda don't get the dual thematic sections of the album itself.

But it's a pretty fun listen!
 
'The Mandrake Project' vs 'Circle Of Stone'.

"Rain On The Graves" vs "Tears In Rain".

"Sonata (Immortal Beloved)" vs "The Broken Man / Absence / Until We Meet Again"

:ninja:
 
Gave the new Blaze album a listen...

I am glad Blaze Bayley still makes records. He's a really decent guy, seems to really love what he does and is truly grateful for his fans. I certainly don't think he's of the same caliber as many other bands I love, but he's fun and he makes decent records. Circle of Stone is no exception. Blaze continues to come into his voice here, which is a shocking thing to say for a 60 year old man but it truly feels like he is always figuring himself out a bit. He sounds light years better now than he did in the 90s, that's for sure.

I'm not gonna get too deep into this, so here's some basic notes.

The Bad
  • The production is incredibly artificial. Guitars sound great, everything else is muffled and static. Blaze's voice alternates between sounding natural and artificial (occasionally within the same song, re: the transition into the heavy part of Rage).
  • Drums are just awful. No one will convince me that this was a live drummer playing on a live kit. An electronic kit, maybe. But ultimately it sounds like artificial drum tracks.
  • The Broken Man is truly dreadful.
The Good
  • Even though it's "an album in two parts", I find the track listing to be quite effective. Really good progression from song to song and mood to mood.
  • Mind Reader is awesome. Blaze sounds fired up.
  • The intro to Rage is one of Blaze’s most charismatic performances ever. After that, eh...
  • The main riff and verse riff of Ghost In The Bottle is the most exciting thing to come out of anything Maiden-related in a long, long time. Kinda sounds like a combination of Sabaton and a sped up King In Crimson. Too bad about the vocals, though.
  • Title track slaps. Main riff of Absence also slaps.
  • A Day of Reckoning is a solid little mini-epic.
  • Closing on an acoustic ballad is nice. I don't love it, but it's nice. The duet works well.
That's about it. Like most of Blaze's solo efforts, I doubt I'll go back to this much, but it's a solid listen despite some lackluster songs and super flat production.
 
Yax said:
"Whoever producing and mixing his record: So, errh, Blaze, how hard should we pitch correct/auto tune your vocals?

Blaze: Yes. "

;)

Another record rendered unlistenable. This is a great song, but the level of overdone pitch correction in War Within Me and obviously Circle of Stone is absolutely toxic.
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Just checked a few tracks out on Spotify, jaysus it was like listening to Cher at some parts
 
The album is absolutely great. A Day Of Rackoning is a Masterpiece, the fact that a Song can be Epic without being 10 minutes plus long....... Yes the overproduced vocals are there and it's a pity because Blaze sounds incredible live , he doesn't Need that.
 
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rideon77 said:
The album is absolutely great. A Day Of Rackoning is a Masterpiece, the fact that a Song can be Epic without being 10 minutes plus long....... Yes the overproduced vocals are there and it's a pity because Blaze sounds incredible live , he doesn't Need that.
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It was the first song that stood out to me on the first listen when I hear the album a few weeks ago. I would argue it’s his best song since working with Absolva. It used to be stored between ‘The Dark Side of Black’ and ‘The World is Turning the Wrong Way’. Those are truly amazing songs. This belongs up there.
 
Ascendingthethrone said:
It was the first song that stood out to me on the first listen when I hear the album a few weeks ago. I would argue it’s his best song since working with Absolva. It used to be stored between ‘The Dark Side of Black’ and ‘The World is Turning the Wrong Way’. Those are truly amazing songs. This belongs up there.
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Absolutely, great stuff
 
Gave a listen, this is a massive improvement from WWM imo. A lot of the songs (The Year Beyond This Year, Ghost in the Bottle, A Day of Reckoning...) have an edge I didn't feel in that album. Blaze's performance is great, but still way too much autotune. The Broken Man... Ugh, that's a King of Metal song and you can't tell me otherwise. Very exciting all in all.
 
Yax said:
It's not relatively mild though. It's crazy excessive. Mild autotune is what's on the BLAZE albums, as in, barely noticeable and in spots.
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I like the album so much that I Don't care. I think it's a production choice to obtain a certain sound with a low budget. Might be a mistake but I Don't care, Blaze's voice is fantastic live, so it's not and issue for me. He's not Ace Frehley or Ozzy that Need outotune or some magic in studio.
Maiden should process a Little bit the vocals in studio, some High parts sound too strained that it's hard to enjoy the Song
 
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rideon77 said:
I think it's a production choice to obtain a certain sound with a low budget.
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It's not. It's laziness (you can punch-in record over a bad note or line so the pitch correction doesn't have to work as hard...) and incompetence, and I suppose that incompetence could translate into an objectively shitty choice to overuse pitch correction in a poor way and have it work too much and all the time, and multiple vocal tracks demand that you're not off pitch, so that's a reason for pitch correction harder too, but it's better to not rely on layered vocals if you can't sing in pitch well enough to handle it - So it's a choice in that regard. Blaze doesn't go to a vocal studio and pays to record his takes. He records his takes at home, just like a bunch of other guys do. If you purchase a vocal take from Ripper Owens or Ralph Scheepers, that record from their home studios, you get a stem track with effects and processing. They do it from their homes, just like Blaze does, but they deliver takes that aren't crazy pitch corrected (that being said, both are objectively more proficient singers, but that's beside the case). Blaze didn't overuse it until War Within Me. It was perfectly ok during the Black trilogy.

Edit: Look, I really want to puchase everything Blaze puts out, because I really like his solo career, but he's making it very hard lately. I skipped out on War Within Me, I bought his last live album, but I haven't decided if I'm going to give him my money for this product. We'll see. I'm delighted to see him on tour again though, it has been far too long (2nd or 3rd William Black album).
 
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Yax said:
It's not. It's laziness (you can punch-in record over a bad note or line so the pitch correction doesn't have to work as hard...) and incompetence, and I suppose that incompetence could translate into an objectively shitty choice to overuse pitch correction in a poor way and have it work too much and all the time, and multiple vocal tracks demand that you're not off pitch, so that's a reason for pitch correction harder too, but it's better to not rely on layered vocals if you can't sing in pitch well enough to handle it - So it's a choice in that regard. Blaze doesn't go to a vocal studio and pays to record his takes. He records his takes at home, just like a bunch of other guys do. If you purchase a vocal take from Ripper Owens or Ralph Scheepers, that record from their home studios, you get a stem track with effects and processing. They do it from their homes, just like Blaze does, but they deliver takes that aren't crazy pitch corrected (that being said, both are objectively more proficient singers, but that's beside the case). Blaze didn't overuse it until War Within Me. It was perfectly ok during the Black trilogy.

Edit: Look, I really want to puchase everything Blaze puts out, because I really like his solo career, but he's making it very hard lately. I skipped out on War Within Me, I bought his last live album, but I haven't decided if I'm going to give him my money for this product. We'll see. I'm delighted to see him on tour again though, it has been far too long (2nd or 3rd William Black album).
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I agree on the points about autotune. I’m not a fan of it (except for early Autotune the news!) I think there is a financial aspect to why he doesn’t record in a professional studio. To be fair, the results would be better but maybe the difference is not worth the cost. It’s like when I gig on the bass. I like to have an amp but I actually love it when I don’t have to bring one and just go through a DI. Sure amps sound better but the difference in quality between an amp and DI is not enough for me to care.

Anyway back to Blaze. He’s a good chap and he’s always grateful of the support he’s received. Plus his music is good.

We all hear things differently. That’s what makes the forum interesting.
 
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