Customer Reviews

Through Painful Lanes

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

 

 

Lance personally gave me this disc and said "Ian, you will love this disc" or something to that affect. I have been listening to it pretty consistently over the last 2 months and I gotta say what a gem Lance found. The band has a lot to offer from excellent production to talent, also don't confuse them with the Australian Psychedelic band.

The band began in the mid-90s in France. After a few demos they were picked up Nuclear Blast and had "Meeting In The Mist" released. This release is their most recent and was mastered by Mika Jussila.

The first two tracks are a couple of my favorites so I will begin with them. "The Beast Within" is an amazing track to begin an album with. At first the guitar tone almost sounds too thick for the vocal due to the higher pitch, but during the chorus it becomes more of a DRAGONFORCE kind of sound, but the vocals have more of a fullness then DRAGONFORCE. The acoustic part reminds me of something from BLIND GUARDIAN's "Nightfall In Middle Earth" disc. The second track contains an awesome epic chorus with a crazy Prog time signature in the drums and the guitars. The melodies from the backing vocals complement the song extremely nice, though I am not sure if I could even effectively describes it, kudos though.

The third and fourth tracks are solid, but they lack the greatness of my favorites. "Restless Show" goes back to the sound of the first two that I liked so much, but it isn't quite as good. "Everlasting Farewells" is easily my favorite track on the album just for its overall epic-ness. It starts off kind of slower with the vocals and the backing chorus giving the song that epic-ness and then it hits the apex and you can feel it in you chest and you kind of get goosebumps on your arms because of the awesomeness that is being bestowed upon your environment. Then back to the slower intro sound to fade out. The final tracks on the album are great too and the fall into the same area as tracks three and four, solid good tracks, but not comparable to my favorite. The last track is a cover of the HELLOWEEN classic and is a pretty standard version to my ears.

I would highly recommend this disc to any fan of epic or melodic Power Metal. Definitely for fans of HELLOWEEN and DRAGONFORCE, but also for fans of more Prog-oriented stuff like PAGAN'S MIND. This will be in my top ten for the year more then likely. ALKEMYST FOR Nightmare Fest 2009!!!

Truly great power/prog metal album from a band with a lot of potential. Finishes off with a cover of Eagle Fly Free by Helloween. If i want to get really picky I'd say he changes his vocal style on the cover to sound like Andi Deris, rather than keeping with his clean style. My favorite is the 8+ minute epic, "When the Morning Comes". But rather than wasting your time reading a 10 page review, go buy it already!

Someone on Youtube of all places recommended this to me as thanks for me recommending Suspyre - A Great Divide (absolutely fantastic prog/power/classical hybrid). I need to thank that guy again, because this is easily the best power metal album I've bought in a long time. And like most good power metal, it also has strong progressive leanings

The description calls this Dragonforce + Symphony X. This is nowhere near as cheesy as DF, the songs are much better written and more varied, plus they lack the neoclassical side of Symphony X. I think a better comparison would be Helloween + old Pyramze + Circus Maximus. Incidenatlly, Through Painful Flames is VASTLY superior to it's contemporary, the disappointing Pyramaze - Immortal. This is what that album should have been.

Also, unlike so much power metal, this doesn't give the impression of being the musical equivalent of "cotton candy" (tasty but not at all filling). You can really tell they put a lot of thought into their compositions and writing, and didn't just record whatever popped into their heads like many bands do today. The instrumentation is unusually complex and layered for power metal.

Really, if you like power/prog at all, and don't mind a somewhat Helloween-ish style, I can almost guarantee you'll like this.