Just noticed I made a few posts on this board but never actually introduced me: hello, I'm Rob, from Rome, Italy. I have been listening to metal and progressive for a very long time, and play the bass in a local hard rock band (as you may have guessed by the avatar
). When it comes to progressive metal, what I like is the combination of power and melody!
I was introduced to S-X with DWOT and year by year felt that they made a great effort topping the previous album with each new one (now I wouldn't say "each", actually, but at the time I felt so). Saw them live 3 times so far, and the show on the PL tour in Florence really blew me away!
Like many of you, I was blown away by V and was a bit disappointed when I first heard The Odyssey: Inferno starts great but when Russel kicks in I felt I was listening to a Pantera album or so. I took some time to get used to it and now i LOVE the way the songs kicks in, and in general like the album, especially the title track and, huh, The Turning.
When PL came out I was blown away again, the combination of heaviness and melody is superb and 8 songs out of 10 would end up in any SX playlist I'd do.
So, when Iconoclast came out, I was wondering if they would have - again! - topped the previous album. The title track and End of Innocence gave me that exact feeling, despite it was clear that there was too much heaviness compared to the melody... so the rest of the album was a total disappointment. What happend to those soaring vocals? To those epic choirs? Or even just the backing vocals? And, above all: was Pinnella at the toilet while they were recording?
I mean, I felt it was not BAD or so, but basically too much pedal-to-the-metal: all of the melody we got used to hear from them is buried under tons of guitars.
Then the weeks passed, I listened to single songs from time to time and I have to admit that they keep on growing on me. It's just different, less easy listening, less accessible, but after getting used to it the melody comes out. Dehumanized at first seems to be a heavier-than-heavy song, especially for that rough chorus, so it takes some listentings to find out that beautiful "is this life worth a question why" part. When All Is Lost is less accessible as well, it took some time to realize how great it is, especially the chorus. These are the highlights of the album to me, but perhaps some of the others may grow as well. Light Up The Night, for example, is not as bad as I read on this board. Believe it or not, but it reminded me some of Fool's Paradise!
Anyway, I still think they haven't topped PL with this latest release, I still think that they exceeded with heaviness and aggression and badly hope they won't go any further in this direction in the future. I'm just glad I've found some songs I really like and hopefully some more will pop out later. And, of course, didn't regret much for not seeing them this last time, knowing THAT setlist in advance.
Huh, what a long post!
