Affector
Harmagedon

So, the year of doomsday is half over and besides an unusually cold summer thanks to global warming there has not been that many signs of the apocalypse just yet. Still, despite the fact that there is no sign of harmagedon, these affecters think it is a wise idea to make an album based to its lion’s share on the biblical stories about this event from the Book of Revelations. The cover art is a bit doomsdayish and the same can be said about the fact that they use four very prominent keyboardists and give them free reign to do whatever they want. Keyboarders like Derek Sherinian and Jordan Ruddess of Dream Theater Fame, Neal Morse of course makes an appearance as well. As for the quartet that makes up the band who are debuting with this album, they are debuting as a band but they are an experienced bunch with an extensive collective experience from many different bands. So the people appears to be the right ones and the story is a fascinating one but can it deliver the goods?

It does not give the sense of an impending doomsday that much is certain, actually the mood feels rather positive even when the beast comes rising from his eternal flames and when the cry songs are appearing. Musically complex with varying time signatures, atypical structures and the odd masturbation, that is what can be found throughout the eight songs on this album. An album that plays for little over one hour and the music during this hour is quite varied, the keyboarders makes the most of their creative freedom which you can hear through most of the album as well as some other skilled instrumentations which seems important to these guys to show off. But even with the songs being quite complex, there is still room for a bit of catchiness which might possibly make it appealing to fans other than the ones dedicated to the progressive metal genre but at the same time the typical progressive elements might scare those away after hearing that catchy chorus. Excellent production and the sound is brilliant giving this a good melodic feel and with the smooth voice of the singer it has a really good feel to it. A quality production I would say.

All the cards are stacked in favour of this album, it is melodic, it has the right guys, the sound is brilliant, there is catchiness and there are some really clever stuff here and the concept is a great one as well, it should be great. But it isn’t. It is good but it does not capture me, it is surprisingly bland if I am honest. Although nothing is bland about the performances, they are colourful and sometimes exciting but most of the time it is just masturbation that is detrimental to the whole and in the end I find myself not overly amused with what I hear. The less is more concept probably should be taught to these guys at it feels very needed here. There are parts that I really like but the overall feel is that it is overworked, too much show off and too little substance to really work.

The ending song New Jerusalem is a really good ending and song, it is the only one that I feel is really living up to the band’s potential. A brilliant song it is and when hearing it I am ready for a higher rating until I recall what led up to it, not an ordeal maybe but a bit of a difficult task to focus fully on. Not because of natural disasters, if you don’t count giving four guest keyboardists free reign to live out their own ideas as a natural disaster that is. So, I am not really hopping with joy but on the other hand it is not bad and there are many elements that are really good so it can be said to be a positive impression I have of this album although it could have been so much better considering the potential it shows.

So in the end I would have to say that this album doesn’t show the apocalyptic songs that makes the horsemen sit up on their horses but it is good enough for an hour’s worth of entertainment if one can overlook some excessive soloing. Thing is though, it is impossible to shake the impression that this good album should have been a lot better, all the elements were there but it just did not come together like that.