Official Off Topic Thread

[EyeballKid]

I can't think of a single instance of this happening.

"The Great Pandemonium" sounds like the opening of "March of Mephisto" was dragged out into 4 minutes. Khan seems to have no idea what he wanted to do with the vocals.

"Necropolis" is vocally disjointed, with more vocal effects than a Britney Spears autotune machine.

On "Seal of Woven Years" Khan sounds like he just wore out his voice singing a 4 hour set of gospel tunes. The melody is inconsistent, in a way that could be heard as progressive, but by this point in the CD just sounds lazy and uninspired.

Epica: Is it me, or are there like 5 songs on this album that sound exactly the same? It's cool and conceptual, but it runs together.

Agreed. However, it also has "Lost & Damned", which may be my favorite Kamelot song of all time.

 

[Kenneth R.]

Isn't the point of a concept album that "it all runs together"? I think they succeeded mightily, though not as good as The Black Halo. Reasons being songs slightly less diverse/interesting, and the circus interludes that could have been better written.

 

[Postulate]

I love the "At the Banquet" interlude in Epica. Absolutely perfect - and A Feast for the Vain is a great follow-up.

 

[Harris The Epic]

Well nothing is always going to be true 100% of the time, including what I said. That's just how I feel about a lot of things; not necessarily everything. And there are also other things that make an album good than how the songs run together.
What Genesis album are you thinking of?

 

[Harris The Epic]

On another note, I just got back home from my first real performing gig in 5 yeras. Up until now it's been all engineering side of performance. It feels good to get back on the side that people pay attention to... even if I was tucked all the way back in the shadows.

 

[donKyle]

I've never been that into Kamelot. I think I had a few days stretch a few years ago where I listened to Black Halo, but that's about it.

 

[Wander]

Why/where did the soundtrack thread disappear?

 

[Detective Clarence Beauregard]

Epica: Is it me, or are there like 5 songs on this album that sound exactly the same? It's cool and conceptual, but it runs together.

It's a concept album!

I take it you don't like V all that much, do you?

 

[donKyle]

But V doesn't sound the same throughout

 

[Detective Clarence Beauregard]

But it does all run together.

And there are some similar-sounding sections spread across the album to tie the musical concept together.

 

[Postulate]

I have to agree, Epica sounds very samey, and not in a good way. It also has a great atmosphere (suits the story well) and a lot of good melodies, but it's musically pretty unsophisticated compared to Siége Perilous and a couple parts of the Fourth Legacy. A lot of the songs are redundant - if you've got Center of the Universe, A Feast for the Vain, and Carry On, you've got the whole album. The other songs are solid but tend to, as we said, "run together." Though some parts of them aren't redundant, like the chanting in Edge of Paradise and the opening vocals in Descent of the Archangel. Other than that, though...it could have been ~20 minutes long just as well.

Kamelot power rankings!

Eternity - Solid album that suffers form poor production and a bad singer. Would have been among their best if re-recorded.

Dominion - As with Eternity, but a bit more unique and adventurous. A sign of good things to come...

Siége Perilous - In my opinion, the band's finest album. Still "regal" rather than "edgy," musically more satisfying than what was to come. Poor production, but oh well. Love Siege - disappointed that the band abandoned their instrumentals, as well as their more uniquely structured songs (Providence) and their less conventional ones (Expedition).

Fourth Legacy - A bit of a disappointment - starts the slide into europower, but still better than your typical band of the genre. Glory is nice, and Lunar Sanctum is IMO the band's best song ever, and sounds like it belongs with the first three albums. A lot of the songs are now subpar (Alexandria, Shadow of Uther...meh).

Karma - If I'm trying to abstract away from my own idiosyncracies, this is probably Kamelot's most well-rounded album and their finest "objective" (whatever that means) accomplishment. The title track is incredible.

Epica - As I said above, I find this album extremely inconsistent and redundant. A few standout tracks, but as a whole one of the band's weakest works, and highly overrated.

The Black Halo - Some of the tracks on this album are horrible (when the lights are down, this pain), but some are excellent (Abandoned, The Black Halo, Memento Mori). I like the production on this one - modern and clean, without being extravagant like on their two newest albums.

Ghost Opera - I think most people agree with me here. This is just a weak album. Anthem could have been a brilliant ballad, but it's soaked in cheesy orchestral effects and lame voice tricks. EdenEcho is the only excellent song on it. Everything else is IMO not worth listening to.

Poetry for the Poisoned - Forgettable, half-hearted.

 

[Kenneth R.]

Ridley Scott confirms Blade Runner 2 to be made with female protagonist.

W.T.F.?

Please don't fuck it up Ridley. Please.

 

[ABQShredHead]

Yeah, just go watch Alien if you want to see the female protagonist thing.

 

[Kenneth R.]

Alien was good though. Way better than AVP2.

That's my worry with Blade Runner as a sequel... will he get Vangelis to do the music? Will he get awesome actors? Will it be existential, dystopian?

Or will the whole thing turn into a Minority Report/Transformers Michael Bay clusterfuck?

 

[Sauna]

I'm genuinely terrified of Ridley Scott's unearthing of both the Blade Runner and the Alien franchises. Both Blade Runner 2 and Prometheus have infinite potential but will probably just end up hurting the lore, and I'll have to add them to the list of movies that I pretend don't exist. Then again, Alien 3 and Resurrection as well as the AvP-series are already on that list, so not much to lose on that side.

@Kenneth: Why would you compare Minority Report with Transformers? I'm not a huge fan of the former but it definitely doesn't deserve to be lumped in with the latter.

 

[Kenneth R.]

It's an action movie that shouldn't have been an action movie, and it had Tom Cruise :ugh: in it, "action" music, etc. It's the wrong future. It's a huge departure from what Blade Runner is about, but I can see it happening in a sequel: The "Blade runner" protagonist chases replicants and has pitched gun battles with them throughout the film, with exploding stuff, fast-paced action music, and perhaps some oblique treatment of the human identity topic as a one-liner. More about special effects and sci-fi technology than story.

 

[Harris The Epic]

But V doesn't sound the same throughout

^ is the point I'm making.

I have to agree, Epica sounds very samey, and not in a good way. It also has a great atmosphere (suits the story well) and a lot of good melodies, but it's musically pretty unsophisticated compared to Siége Perilous and a couple parts of the Fourth Legacy. A lot of the songs are redundant - if you've got Center of the Universe, A Feast for the Vain, and Carry On, you've got the whole album. The other songs are solid but tend to, as we said, "run together." Though some parts of them aren't redundant, like the chanting in Edge of Paradise and the opening vocals in Descent of the Archangel. Other than that, though...it could have been ~20 minutes long just as well.

Yeah, Postulate gets what I'm saying.
When I said "Run Together" I didn't mean that the songs flow well. They do, but that's not what I was referring to. There's a big difference between "running together" and "flowing well". Flowing well is, to me, the opposite of bad. Running together is, for me, not a good thing.

Too many commas at the end. I need to learn my punctuation.


EDIT: Oh, wait, everyone is done talking about Kamelot. Just like on their own forum

 

[Sauna]

^--- I understand the point you're making, I just don't agree with it.

It's a huge departure from what Blade Runner is about, but I can see it happening in a sequel: The "Blade runner" protagonist chases replicants and has pitched gun battles with them throughout the film, with exploding stuff, fast-paced action music, and perhaps some oblique treatment of the human identity topic as a one-liner. More about special effects and sci-fi technology than story.

Yeah, this is exactly what I'm afraid will happen too. I really hope Ridley is doing this only because he genuinely feels he can add to the Blade Runner story instead of just creating a sequel for it because the original movie eventually grew into a big thing.

Ah, who am I kidding, it's obviously happening for the second reason.

 

[Kenneth R.]

Maybe if we all mail him 10,000 copies of Phillip K Dick novels he'll take a hint?

Imagine if James Cameron decided to do Moby Dick, in 3D. That's how I feel right now. The rape and pillage of classic literature. I'm glad that "At The Mountains Of Madness" got shelved, because I was horrified to consider what sort of assrape it would get by modern directing, more gruesome than any of Lovecraft's monsters.

 

[Phanto]

I was actually excited about At the Mountains of Madness. I like Lovecraft's work and I wouldn't want people to see a blockbuster and go "oh so that's Lovecraft", I would want them to read the books, but I think Guillermo del Torro or whatever could make a nice rendition. If I would have to pick any director to make a Lovecraft movie it would be him. Pan's Labyrinth was amazing. Hellboy was mediocre but had amazing atmosphere and visuals.

A Game of Thrones is a perfect example of literature rendition that I simply don't give a fuck about if it's true to the books or not, because it's a fantastic show regardless. To be honest I would rather they did their own thing to make the TV show as interesting as possible. Obviously it's different because they collaborate with GRRM and, well, Lovecraft is dead.

While I don't like the idea of a Blade Runner 2, I have to say that Alien prequel looks pretty decent. Really nice cast at least.

That prequel of The Thing made me angry. So unnecessary.