?Classics? of power metal #6: AVANTASIA - The Metal Opera (2001), early impressions

Past exposure to this band/record: I don't think any. A few years ago I did listen to a then-new symphonic power-prog record with a lot of guest vocalists.  I remember that whatever band put out the record was a legacy act, pretty well respected, and that I was struck by how song after song seemed to have the right elements yet never once grabbed me. What I no longer have even the slightest memory of is the name of that band or that record.  Since the name "Avantasia" probably didn't mean anything to me back then, I can't say that it definitely wasn't them. But, anyway, as far as I know, I've not listened to Avantasia before.

 

Fun with names:  As best as I can tell, the official name of the band is "Avantasia" rather than "Tobias Sammet's Avantasia," despite what's on the album cover.  While we're at it, it might be worth noting that coming in, I know Tobias Sammet only through reputation.  His work is a big back box for someone who's had a lot of success with two projects, so time to change that!  Prior to The Metal Opera, I can't imagine Tobias's name being big enough to name a project after, so I assume it's more of an authorial credit thing.  My understanding is that Avantasia was a passion project he was working on on the side while Edguy was his main gig.  Speaking of which... to my sense of language one really imagines that if either band was the side project, it'd be Edguy because, well, it's called "Edguy."  "Avantasia" at least sounds like a metal band, although based on the name alone I'd assume a cheesy one.  "Edguy" sounds like it should be the name for when one of Mike Patton's side projects has its own side project.  Also, most sources join the cover art in calling the record just The Metal Opera (without a "Pt. I," although yes, the story stops halfway through because it was always planned as a duology).  So that's what I'm going with.

 

 

On my first listen to The Metal Opera I was going to muse some about how we were now firmly in the "symphonic" era of power metal.  Maybe I was caught up in the idea of a metal opera - I'm not a fan of opera, but I sort of get the appeal.*  Anyway, I had in mind that I would frame TMO as a record the could only have been recorded in a world in which Rhapsody, Stratovarius, Sonata Arctica, and so on were all freely throwing keys into their songs and pretending to play a form of classical music, and tossing melody lines to a permanent keyboardist was commonplace.  Seems relevant to Opera in a way that it wasn't to anything else I've profiled so far.  (Yeah, The Dark Ride had a lot of keys.  Its keyboards were used almost exclusively for texture rather than melody.  Its keyboardist wasn't even an official member of the band!)   Interesting that this element ever jumped out at at all, though.  Keys or no keys, what Avantasia are playing has a pretty straightforward EUPM sound.  Tobias's keys could easily be replaced by a properly petal'd second guitar in most cases, or vice versa, with no real difference to the song.  Occasionally there'll be a song like "Sign Of The Cross" wherein the keys are used very deliberately to create a martial tone; otherwise, I don't know how they assigned what we be a blazing keyboard part and what would be a blazing guitar part.

 

Hence, songs that sound, well, a lot like Helloween - I'm sure it helps the comparison that the core band is kind of a German PM supergroup that includes Markus Grosskopf on bass - and the record leans hard into the comparison by heavily featuring Michael Kiske, including as the instantly recognizable lead voice on the first "real" song.  If I were going to pull in another sub-genre besides PM, there's just enough noodling that Opera may brush against the edges of prog metal, with longer songs that have extra parts and such.  I do feel like "real" prog would have more time signature changes mid-song, and not every song would be verse-chorus-verse-chorus-solo-chorus-chorus-chorus.  The songs feel long, but other than "The Tower" it's not because they have movements or a big scope from a compositional standpoint.  Solos just tend to go on extra long and outros tend to repeat the chorus a few dozen extra times.   I do like "The Tower" pretty well, but otherwise if this band's idea of something epic is interminable guitar solos that don't convey anything in particular to me, I'm glad the track length settles down outside the first couple and the last couple.

 

"Reach Out For The Light" stands out in a negative way as a song that sounds fine - better than fine thanks to Alex Holzwarth's energetic drumming - but could easily have been half as long.  Coming after it, though, "Serpents In Paradise" waves at what the project could become.  With Alex again single-handedly ensuring that it'll be a high energy track, a new singer comes in approaching the story from a different perspective - I want to say it's Tobias himself here (unless that part is David DeFeis?) - and the rougher vocal is a nice counterpoint to Michael from the previous track.  A Deris to Kiske's, uh, Kiske, I suppose.  I deliberately haven't looked up the lyrics, but this character seems to be wrestling with some decisions, supported by the back and forth between the speak-singing verses and a soaring sing-songy main hook.**  The music makes me feel as though the character goes through something and comes out in a different place, hinting at the sort of narrative that can be packed into a song.  And that's just one song of a concept album.  So, the potential to get epic is there.

 

Concept albums aren't in principle all that different from regular albums in that there's a collection of songs, and most or all of them have to be good in order for the record to work.  So we've established that The Metal Opera is a power metal record through and through and that it's a concept album with a few different vocalists, but mostly Michael and (I think) Tobias alternating.  So, how are the songs?  Theyre mostly good.  The hooks are there and the energy is there.  If songs like "Breaking Away" and the title track are mostly going to get by on having a catchy chorus repeated over and over by a singer who can sell it, those choruses need to be there, and I do think that they are, on those songs at least.  Michael's voice is also extremely well suited to carrying the transition from weepy to determined vigor on the it-gets-too-fast-to-really-be-a-ballad "Farewell," a mid-album highlight.****

 

As noted, I'll look up lyrics and try to figure out what the plot is about and who the characters are on later listens.  My vague impression of the plot involves a sinister Church***** hunting for a mystical MacGuffin of some sort, and some guy getting drawn into the center of it because of someone he cares about being accused of witchcraft?  Am I warm?  To be determined whether or not it holds together and whether or not I should care.  

 

But to sum up, I don't think the question is whether it's possible to write a great "opera" using metal, because metal is a pretty big canvas.  The question posed here is whether it's possible to write a great "opera" sticking to really just a few singers and a four-member base band (with guests) using almost exclusively the typical PM bag of tricks.  And the answer is... probably?

  

Favorite track:  "Serpents In Paradise"

Runner up:  "Farewell"

Least favorite track:  "Inside"

Preliminary rating:  3.5/5 

Next:  More on The Metal Opera, whenever I get around to it!

 

 

*Thanks to an episode of Elsbeth, I am convinced that another version of me with different taste in music could easy end up as an opera nerd.

 

**I guess it's obvious that I grew up, musically speaking, as a grunge kid.  "Duuude!  The verse is all quiet, and then the chorus is really loud!"***

***"Fuckin' a!"

 

 ****On that one he's kinda duetting with Within Temptation's Sharon den Adel, who seems underused.  If you're going to ape the formula of an opera, that'd seem to be an ideal time to have more than one female singer in the "cast" and/or to give her more than two lines.  Ah, well.

 

*****Apologies to any sixteenth century Catholics reading the blog... but if your setting is going to be inspired by that period of time and the Church isn't the villain, there's a decent chance that you'r doing it wrong.