The Benja-man Is Verbose

A few days ago, I was having a day that wasn't bad, per se, but involved feeling overwhelmed with little things to do of equal unimportance, needing to force myself to do a certain detail oriented task, and just exhausted.  I was absolutley not in the mood for power metal, and needed mopier, downbeat, avant-gard sort of music for the occasion.  Late in the afternoon, I did put on  Falconer , though.  The record as a whole, and "Wings Of Serenity" in particular, hit the spot.  The next day was a much better day for high-energy anthems.  Falconer  fit in well there, too, and "Wings Of Serenity" in particular hit the spot.  I've long been a believer in the premise that good enough music ought not to be limited to one's mood, at least not for me personally.  Sure, certain stuff is a better fit for certain times, but I like to listen to what I like to listen, and listening to what I like makes me feel good.  So I choose to read some...

Past exposure to this band/record:   Zero. I've been looking forward to this one way too much, I think.   I come in ready to open some new horizons with Falconer, since they always pop up as the supposed unique PM band that everyone needs to know about.  Since we finished with Adramelch, I've spent a lot of time basically in the realm of traditional German-style power metal and, well, the last few records I've written about are variations on that theme.  Often interesting variations, to be sure.  We had traditional German PM in the vein of Helloween except in its rawer form with Death Or Glory , except backcrossed with various early-80s forms of metal with Glory To The Brave , except front-crossed with the rest of the rock and metal world with The Dark Ride , * and except with an ensemble cast with The Metal Opera .  Fine, fine.  But, look, I started this writing project wanting vicissitudes.  I wanted to hear some bands pushing at t...

Warren Zevon's career is one of those that had a bunch of "comebacks," "returns to form," etc.  That's what happens when you peak... well, early-ish.  As chronicled, he'd certainly paid his dues and spent a decade bumming around the music business before hitting it big with the self-titled and then  Excitable Boy .  Yet I seriously wanted just now to call them "the first two albums," despite knowing full well that they weren't.  Point is, he hit his commercial and to some artistic peak very soon after people started having heard of him at all, and then within a couple years his career was on the downswing.  And so, like artists who peak early, fans of each record would inevitably hail it as a return to form .   After  The Envoy  flopped,  Sentimental Hygiene  was the first of a series of mini-comebacks.  You've got Zevon newly sober and getting back in touch with his roots, you've got the promising pairing with a little band ca...

Picking up the twin questions of whether The Metal Opera succeeds as a power metal record and as a concept album.  I'm a bit surprised to find that its success with the former is part of the reason I'm more mixed on the latter. So, the songs here are generally good.  A bunch of catchy metal songs is what you need first and foremost to make a top-tier power metal record.  They nailed that part.  One aspect of Tobias's songwriting that I think needs proper mention is the transition game.  If you're going to play with anything resembling a complex song structure, the pieces need to fit together.  Not only does that happen here, but it's often the source of the hooks.  [Chant, instruments drop out] -> "What is going ooooooon?!" -> [drumroll] -> "Reach out for the light... [chugchugchug]."  Together, that adds up to a hook.  There's an innate understanding here of how one piece of a song should set up another.  End what sounds like i...