Greykiller said:
I wish someone would explain pos to me. I love just about anything metal and will give anyone a shot, but I listened to a couple of albums by these guys about 5x each and felt ambivalent about the music and the message...if I had hated them at least I could have said they moved me emotionally...
But jebus if I cannot even hate a band I would never want to see them live.
Lyrics. Must read the lyrics. Half of the draw of PoS (for me) is Daniel's great lyrics coupled with his emotional delivery of them in his vocals. One of my favorites is "Rope Ends" (from Remedy Lane)....about a suicide attempt by (I believe) a friend of his wife:
http://www.darklyrics.com/lyrics/painofsalvation/remedylane.html#8
The lyrics just paint this incredible image for me...the irony of the images on the tie coupled with the dark subject matter...incredible stuff.
Vocal performance. Listen to "Used" (from "The Perfect Element") along with the lyrics (about an abused child), especially the vocals starting at around 3:30 ("Trading pain is a bad deal....I've got more than my share..."). Amazing range and emotion.
The arrangements are also phenomenal...Daniel's a big fan of musicals (Andrew Lloyd Webber is one of his favorite "songwriters"), and that style of arrangement comes into PoS' music to varying degrees (esp. in "BE", which basically IS a rock musical).
As far as their music, I love the dynamics...how they'll go from fairly soft/light music to really heavy (and back), even in the same song. But again, it's how those transitions match the LYRICS that make it even better....the emotion of the lyrics is brought out in both the vocal performance and the accompanying music.
If you still don't get it, don't feel bad....a friend of mine didn't understand why PoS' "One Hour By The Concrete Lake" blew me away. He listened to it a few times and thought it was "OK," but nothing special. I got an e-mail from him MONTHS later saying that now he understood, and it had grown to be his favorite CD. So, I'm not surprised that you didn't "get it" in 5 listens...many people don't. Read the lyrics, then give OHBTCL or TPE another 5 listens, and read along with the lyrics for at least one of them.
Yeah, it's a lot of effort to "get" a CD, but trust me...it's worth it.
Craig
