Customer Reviews

Infinity Divine

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

If you bought the PM second CD (Celestial Entrance), you know that it is one of the best prog/power metal releases of the decade. I bought the remastered edition of the debut Infinity Divine, the one with the vocals remastered and two bonus tracks, and indeed the vocals are as good as the second album. The instrumental dexterity is also great. The main difference is that the songwriting hasn't quite come together. The mood is also darker across the entire album here. The last bonus track starts downright scary, unless you're pagan, I suppose, with lyrics like "Rise from your grave little sister!" My mother would call it "devil music." No worries, it's basically all singing, and practically no death metal growling.

The production is great, and the songs have no problem flowing from start to finish, it's just that I'm spoiled from Celestial Entrance, which is such a perfect masterpiece of absolute domination and control that I may not be able to judge accurately how good Infinity Divine is. Regardless, my favorite musical moments are Angels' Serenity (sounds like it could belong on the second album), Dawning of the Nemesis (a slower pensive piece), and Twilight Arise for its beautiful guitar and guitar/keyboard riff near the end. If this one had a few more magical moments, like the soaring majesty of Osiris' Eeeeeeeyes, or the instrumental on Celestial Entrance, or even the finality of the riffs from Dreamscape Lucidity, then I could in good conscience give five stars. I'm not sorry I bought this one, but how can I compare it to a CD worth $50 that gives you chills for seventy minutes?

Most North American metal fans first experenced that which was Pagan's Mind back in 2003 with their sophomore debut Celestial Entrance. After the release of that excelent album, many fans were interested in purchasing the band's debut album, Infinity Divine, which was originally released on a smaller independent label. Unfortunately it was poorly distrubuted (but you can still find it here at Amazon, as it's other version of this album that is available).

Due to the demand for a re-release of this album, the band's current record label, Limb Music went ahead and released it, but not before the band insisted on re-recording all the vocals and remastered and editied the original recordings. What we end up with is a powered-up version of the band's debut that shows a promising beginning.

Unfortunately, if you are expecting either version of Infinity Divine to be on par with Celestial Entrance upon purchasing or listening, you may be dissapointed. While the songs on Infinity are good (my personal favorites being Caught in a Dream, Twilight Arise, Angels' Serenity, King's Quest, and both versions of Embracing Fear), they simply cannot compare to the bands work on Celestial Entrance, both musically and lyricly (the lone exception being the re-recorded bonus version of Embracing Fear). This isn't a horrible thing, just don't get you hopes up to high (leave that for their new 2005 album Engmatic: Calling to be released in early April). This and the original version of this album is most likely to only end up in collections of those who consider themselves metal or Pagan's Mind afficiandos.

As I've stated already, the most important aspect of Infinity Divine is that it marks a good start for thre band, a band I and many hope to hear lots of good music from in the years to come. This re-release and remake only enforces this fact and makes this chapter in Pagan's Mind history only that much more enjoyable.

Strangely enough, this copy of Infinty Divine includes two bonus tracks, but gives up the track "Moonlight Pact" found on the original version of the album. While this is quite odd, it's not really a problem as it isn't one of the original version's stronger songs. This will only come to annoy those who must have everything that is Pagan's Mind.

Infinity Devine is a great CD by itself, but an even better addition to Celestial Entrance.A must get if you are a fan of Pagan's Mind.

great cd. great keyboard work and riviting guitar work. a must have.

I'll be honest, I don't own any of their albums (yet), but from all the samples I've heard this band sounds exactly like what Queensryche would sound like today had they kept with their '80s metal roots, but updated to the new millenium's power metal sound. The vocals sound almost exactly like Geoff Tate's whaling. If you didn't know it wasn't Queensryche, you'd probably swear it was.

As of right now, that's all I have to say. When and if I ever get these albums, I'll come back and update this review to reflect my full thoughts.

OK, I'm back with an update. I got these albums and I've now heard this all the way through.

AWESOME stuff!!! Being their first album, one would expect to be a little skeptical, but let me tell you, if havw any interest in bands that use sci-fi elements in their music, this band (and album) is for you. There ain't a bad song on the CD. Every song is great. Most are very long as well...in the 6+ minute range. There's even a couple in the 8+ minute range.

The music itself again is very progressive and hard hitting. You can't really tell fromt the 30 second samples that you get here at Amazon or other places. Because as I said, these songs are quite long and the 30 second samples don't even give you a good feel for what the over-all songs sound like. There's sci-fi elements in most songs in the way of keyboard effects. Very cool stuff.

Now as for the band's name...I can't quite figure that one out. It doesn't really fit the style of music, ie. being sci-fi. You'd think they'd come up with a more sci-fi sounding name, like Gamma Ray Stratovarius or something. ;)

Oh, as for the over-all theme of Pagan's Mind first three albums here, they are obvious big fans of the Stargate series. As the album art and song themes take a huge influence from the Stargate shows. I guess this first album is the first in what is called the "Blue Trilogy". As all three albums are very blue in nature. ;)

this is the one to get! its now even better with the King Diamond cover!