Saber Tiger
Obscure Diversity

Now we delve into obscurity both with a band from Japan, and a title that indicates it. And it is apparently also a diverse album, diverse and obscure – how about that prospect? It seems fascinating. This is the second album by these guys that I review this year; I reviewed their album Bystander Effect earlier this year and like their earlier works it was a good album but perhaps it lacked a little bit of bite. This time they have enlisted the help of producer guru Simone Mularoni for the mixing and mastering and they have an artwork that looks pretty exciting but it is not a great artwork.

The music can be described as heavy metal of the Japanese flavour, most bands I have heard from Japan sounds kind of similar and that is how these guys sound. This new album is fairly similar to the predecessor but perhaps with a bit more zest and progressive edge. The sound is good, as is the vocalist. The variation is decent as well with okay depth; the album is long though with a playing time well surpassing the one-hour mark. So, it is probably a fair bit on the longer side and that could be seen as a little bit negative but the sound is good and very solid – perhaps a step up compared with what they did on the album before but not a huge leap.

Good album, I like it, as the songs are good, the melodies pretty strong and the production really strong. It works and those of you who like the Japanese rocker and especially Saber Tiger will most certainly enjoy this album as well. It is a fairly entertaining album and I don’t think there are any weaker track, the tracks are all of good quality, the weakness is the long playing time – I think that they easily could have done away with a few of those tracks to create a more energetic and dynamic album. Perhaps they could have saved a few tracks to a later album, which would probably have helped this album to achieve some greatness.

The ending conclusion will have to be that this is another strong album, but I also think the album could have been much more exciting with a little bit more bite. The teeth of the tiger might not be a sabery and sharp as the name seem to indicate. And I also think that it could have been a little bit more diverse and a bit more obscure in terms of the style.

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