Cd Reviews

Slowly making my way through forgotten cds and my christmas purchases.

Apocalyptica's 7th Symphony is the band's seventh album, shocking I know. It is a nice follow up to World's Collide, but it doesn't have the same umph as the previous record. It does have some left over tracks from World's Collide like Bring them to Light featuring Joseph Duplaintier, from Gojira. It was supposed to go on WC, but both JD and the band were disatisfied with the track and reworked it for this album.

One of my favorite tracks on the records, Not Strong Enough, to my surprise (and not in a good way) was NOT written by the band. The lyrics are written by the guest vocalist, Brent Smith of Shinedown, but the song credit goes to Diane Warren. If the name is vaguely familiar check it out: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diane_Warren

I must admit I was a tad disappointed that the band has to have other people write them songs. At any rate. A solid album, no weak tracks, but none will blow you away. The REAL stand out IMO is Rage of Poseidon, aptly followed by The Shadow of Venus. I can totally see ROP in an action movie soundtrack: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AYa1OlWH_Zo

Worth picking up if you are already a fan, to newbies I'd suggest to wait.
 
Onhell said:
I went ahead and got Stratovarius' last CD not knowing what to expect. This band has been in turmoil for so many years and has had real and fake scandals alike (in early 2000 it was said Kotipelto was fired and replaced with a female singer, just for the sake of publicity) and their last three albums were sub-par and that's being nice. Like Opeth, Stratovarius is a one man band with 99.9% of its writing coming from Timmo Tolki. Again like Opeth, Tolki was not a founding member of Stratovarius but immediately took over upon joining in the early 80s. The classic line-up, of course, is that from 1995 to just recently of Tolki at guitar, Kotipelto in vocals, Jorg Michael on drums, Jens Johansson on keyboards and Jari Kainulainen  on Bass. That line-up produced some of the most iconic Power Metal only rivaled by that of early Helloween.

Anyway, after hitting a noticeable dip in quality on the Elements Pt. 1 and Pt. 2 albums followed by a horrible mess of a self-titled album, Tolki quit the band, signed over the rights to the rest of the band and the band moved on and mad Polaris. What does a Tolki-less Stratovarius sound like? Well, with writing efforts from all members including new guitarist, Matias Kupiainen, and bassist, Lauri Porra They have not missed A SINGLE BEAT. This is very much a back to roots effort if there ever was one. Is it as majestic as  Visions or any other of their mid 90s releases? No. But it reminds me of Fourth Dimension where it is a very solid album with good to great tracks on it. very awesome. Pick it up
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Their newest album, elysium, came out last week. I haven't got it yet but its meant to be really good, better then polaris.
 
Thanks for taking the time to introduce new music to us, Onhell and Jupz. I am curious about the new Stratovarius as well.
 
No Problem! I'll probably wait a few weeks and see if its still worth buying (if people are starting to get bored of it after a few weeks then I may not purchase it). I've checked out some of the songs on youtube and they seem pretty solid, including a 18-minute title track. They seem to be taking on a more progressive sound in this album.

Infernal Maze:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yUNlH4Zl ... re=related

Other tracks are on this guys channel.


Also, thanks for all the reviews Onhell. I read through them all and they are interesting reads. I may have to do some myself when I next buy some music. You've convinced me not to buy 7th Symphony, and although I've never listened to Avantasia those youtube clips sound really good and I may have to buy some of them.
 
Elysium is a really great album. Thank God Tolkki left. I suppose you know this, but Tolkki really is insane, he has to take medications to stay normal. It's no surprise that the other members couldn't stand him. Just listen to his latest solo album. He's convinced that it's a masterpiece.

About the album - I think it's slightly better than Polaris, but Polaris has better ballads. Move The Mountain is least good song, and the title track takes a lot of time to digest because it's 18+ minutes long. All the other songs are really great, especially Event Horizon which is probably the best song on the album.
 
Great thread..
Like everyone else I cannot afford to spend a lot, but I do make an effort to save up and buy original official releases of my favourite bands and other nice albums..
This is my way of supporting them  :ok:

Anway my very last Non-Maiden but Heavy Rock related cd is ROSS THE BOSS - HAILSTORM and I really love it.
Here are some photos I took of the packaging. Mine is digipak with bonus track.

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1. I.A.G - A short instrumental which is a very nice majestic intro. Fits movies like Gladiator etc. I cant believe how good the intro is as I was not confident this cd will be as good as the first album, but I was wrong, this cd is better.
2. Kingdom Arise - The starting reminds me of Blood Of The Kings. Fabulous fast catchy song. "lord of the fire, lord of the land, lord of the water, lord of the wind" :-)
3. Dead Man's Curve - I think most of us has heard this song since one or two months back as its released for some compilation.
A song that will join Highway Star, Freewheel Burning, Spirit Of The Wheel, Speed Demons type of super songs. " I Ride The Gambling Horse At Extended Trot "
4. Hailstorm - Ok song but great guitars again.
5. Burn Alive - Ah catchy melodic pop chorus, although lyrically about burning in hell haha. " the devil and the deep blue sea...burn alive burn alive in the fires of hell!! ". Ooo this is a band I want to see live, and I got to check where is Ross The Boss position first.
6. Crom - A bit like Ronnie James Dio + Black Sabbath doomy song. Slowly this song is turning to one of my favourites. This song should be played loud with earphones and let the nice drums by Matze "THE GERMAN HAMMER" Mayer pounds to the ears.
7. Behold The Kingdom - I think the weak song in the album. Maybe its my taste which prefer faster RTB songs. But when the song reach the guitar solo till the end, the song transformed itself and RTB can solo forever and its alrite for me.
8. Great Gods Glorious - Glorious Instrumental indeed. Fast and melodic. Suitable for jubilation scenes lol.
9. Shining Path - Another nice song. " Forever Soldiers, Under Our Command ".
10. Among The Ruins - Slow number but not necessary boring haha. Though I think Master Of The Wind is still one of the best slow rock songs ever.
11. Empire's Anthem - And this my friends is Battle Hymn part II. Another song which you can imagine 10,000 horse riders riding side by side to battle.
The backing vocals is something I wish Iron Maiden tried for the Final Frontier album.
The ending of this song is as wonderful and grand as the intro of this cd.
I wonder how Joey De Maio feel on hearing this song.

Bonus track
12. Vindicator - Nice fast song about a jet fighter pilot who is at the flight deck of the aircraft carrier USS Lexington waiting to be catapulted to the skies.


In conclusion,
I think being metal is an in thing nowadays. So for whatever its worth, I think this is a superb metal 'as I know it' cd for those who like Manowar style of music. And I suggest people who have never heard of Ross The Boss band to listen to this cd.


The above photos and text was actually just some of  'cut and paste' from my blog regarding this cd
http://deaf-angel.blogspot.com/2010/11/review-ross-boss-hailstorm.html
 
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I recently picked up Crack the Skye by Mastodon. My brother gave me Blood Mountain for Christmas and I liked it, so I went ahead and picked up their latest effort. I've listened to it alot lately in between my Maiden swings, and to be frank, I love this album. It's fantastic.

There really isn't a bad song on the album. Back to front it's extremely solid, and well worth listening to in its entirety. The highlight for me is The Czar, followed closely by Oblivion. It feels slightly proggy at times, with little flairs of classic rock, but the great solo's, fantastic drumming, and excellent vocals are the take away message for me, I get some of these riffs stuck in my head all the time. I'm also a huge fan of the guitar sound, it's different than most albums i've ever heard, but awesome nonetheless. I'd definitely recommend this to anyone who likes Mastodon but hasn't picked it up. Hell, anyone who's a fan of the type of music Iron Maiden plays should probably give this (or Mastodon) in general, you might like what you hear.
 
Great album indeed. I also like their album artwork with that Eastern feel to them. Leviathan is my favorite, but Crack the Skye is definitely a great pick-up. This is a band that has gotten better from album to album. Thanks for the review!
 
Hmm, not familiar with Leviathan other than the stellar Blood and Thunder, i'll have to give it a listen. Kudos for mentioning it.
 
Mega said:
I really like Crack tthe Skye as well. I should get something else by them.
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Leviathan and Blood Mountain are more accessible than Call of the Mastodon and Remissions....
 
Me and are Friend are it the middle of making a website where people sign-up and can submit album reviews, as soon as it's up and runing I'll post a link!
 
I bought Stratovarius's Elysium and Blind Guardian's At the Edge of Time. I bought them a while back and have been rotating them in my car. I was very pleased with both. I really like Blind Guardian's darker, heavier approach in this album after the bombastic, over-the-top, pseudo medieval atmosphere of the previous two albums. It reminds me of their earlier work. All the songs are based on books, specifically The Wheel of Time series by Robert Jordan.

As for Elysium at first I thought, "Hmm, good album, nice follow-up to Polaris." Then it grew on me and I like it more than Polaris. The title reminded me of Helloween's Song Time off of Better than Raw, and in the second part of the song one of the lines is, "I can hear you calling my name, from the distant skies," Which made me think of distant skies off of Fourth Dimension... I just make odd connections like that lol.

Anyway, the title track is massive and really good, but the one song I'm stuck on is Move the Mountain with music and lyrics by Jens Johanssen. it is one of the power ballads on the album and I don't know what it is about it that captivated me so much. Simple lyrics with cliches about appreciating the small wonders in life, but I just like songs that ask questions, because they get me wondering and reflecting about my own, here's a link to it with the lyrics in the comment box:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZK2KhDBereo

The build up is perfect and while jens gives a great performance on his keyboards, the entire band sounds great on it. Jens and the new members, Lauri Porra and the guitarist Kupainen (forget his first name) have been doing A LOT of writing in the last two albums. Makes me think what they could have produced in the golden years had Tolki not monopolized 99.9% of the writing.

I know many members here already own both albums, but for those few that still don't, they are both worth picking up.
 
Thanks Foro. I forgot to mention the artwork, because there is continuity there too. During the Tolki era, One of the bands trade marks was the Fleur de Li, and now it has been replaced with what seems to be a star. Also The cover of Polaris is a giant star shaped space station making it's way to Earth, the cover of Elysium is the same space station parked at what seems an idyllic paradise. I wonder what the next cover will be, what alien will come out of the space station lol.
 
Been giving Accident of Birth by Bruce a lot of run throughs lately.  I like it a lot better than Chemical Wedding, and to be honest, it may be my favorite work Bruce has ever done.  I find that it has more variety than Chemical Wedding.  It is consistent all the way through, with the two weakest songs (the overly simple and predictable Road to Hell and the cheesy Man of Sorrows) still having enjoyable moments, and the best moments (Darkside, Taking the Queen, Accident of Birth, Starchildren, Omega) being able to stand with his best ever.  I also love the production and this might be the best Bruce's voice has ever sounded.
 
Prowler_108 said:
Been giving Accident of Birth by Bruce a lot of run throughs lately.  I like it a lot better than Chemical Wedding, and to be honest, it may be my favorite work Bruce has ever done.  I find that it has more variety than Chemical Wedding.  It is consistent all the way through, with the two weakest songs (the overly simple and predictable Road to Hell and the cheesy Man of Sorrows) still having enjoyable moments, and the best moments (Darkside, Taking the Queen, Accident of Birth, Starchildren, Omega) being able to stand with his best ever.  I also love the production and this might be the best Bruce's voice has ever sounded.
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Agreed 100% :yes:
 
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