Almah - Fragile Equality 2008

Edu Falaschi from Angra once started Almah as a project where he gathered some fine musicians from other bands like Nightwish, Stratovarius, Kamelot and so forth. Some may call it an all star cast, or at least something like that. One thing was for certain about it though and that was of course the fact that it was not a real band but a project of musicians from different bands and places.

However, for some reason not disclosed in the information I possess, Edu wanted to tour and stuff so he gathered a real band of more local people amongst others a fellow Angra man Felipe Andreoli who also helped Edu with the production of the record. The band highlighted and starred a show in Sao Paolo in front of 40’000 people and now they are entering a new chapter with this new album.

Musically this new album brings out what is called power metal which of course can be considered melodic fast metal with lots of catchy melodies and hooks. Have you heard one or two of the similar bands you will know what I am talking about. Edu’s singing is a bit different in the fact that it is not as high-pitched as most singers of the genre, at times he sounds a bit like Bruce Dickinson of Iron Maiden which of course cannot be considered good, but more on my judgement later on.

The band has also according to the promo sheet a lyrical theme for this record, a theme that is based on a Manga book that Edu was part in creating, also a book that he plans to release, at first only in Brazil but who knows, maybe the rest of the world will follow. The theme however, is about “the balance of all things in the universe” which in theory of course sounds like a good theme and not as boring as dungeons and dragons.

The record starts with a song called Birds of Prey and it is a very good and powerful song which sets a great tone for the record. Following that is nine other tracks making this record a ten track record which is a good number and usually the time of the record is decent with that amount of tracks. I have no real idea about the real length of the record but even with these amount of tracks it feels like a rather long record. The songs are good but they are “as expected” and what does that really mean, as expected? Well, it means that we hear what we can expect from an album in this genre within this small part of that genre. It is nothing new, nothing that breaks from what is established and nothing to really rock the boat. Which is sad, as we all need that in order to fall for new music now that there is all that much out there, this is unfortunately something right in there, something that does not stand out. In short there is really nothing that can catch our attention from the rest out there.

The production is good and the songs are really decent but aside from the opening track there is really nothing that make it stand out, that makes it something we haven’t already seen and that is the real problem for this record. Had it arrived in 1988 or something it would have been great and amazing but now it arrived 20 years later and that is just too late to amaze with this music. Sure the songs are decent and Birds of Prey is even great but a record need to be much better as a complete image, it just don’t grab me.

In the end I find Almah quite good but there is nothing in their music that grab me and makes me want to listen over and over. There is nothing in the band to indicate the name Almah which means “a great step forward”, this is not that.

HHHHHHH

Skriven 2008-11-01