• 1
• 2
• 3
• 4
• 5

A new album from Germany's Mekong Delta and it continues their trend of producing Progressive Thrash Metal. I got their first two albums but after that, I haven't paid much attention to what the band has been doing until now. On this album, they continue with their style but here they lean even more on the progressive side of things. That is not a surprise to the longtime fan as experimentation and technicality have always been a calling card for this band. Having said that there is a mix of metal, blues, jazz and classical music that have been used before to uneven results.

Since I haven't listened to what these guys have done in the past twenty years I cannot make an accurate comparison on how they evolved, so I'll just review the album. First the good: There is a high level of musicianship in the band. That is common for a band of the genre and these guys don't have anything to envy anyone. Their playing is super technical, as if these guys decided what would happen if Dream Theater or Rush adopted a thrash style. The record also has a very strong, clean production and for the style that the band employ I felt that this is a must.

The songwriting on the other hand is a mess. Starting with the ultra long and confusing song titles, they got lost in being deep and ultra-technical. A clear example of this is the vast amount of instrumental and interludes that are present here. Of the fifteen tracks here, nine of them are the aforementioned instrumentals, while some of them are good, most of the time I felt like they dragged on or stopped the momentum of the album. The others songs don't fare much better as the band tried to be as un-catchy as possible, there was little that I remembered from the songs even at the exact time that I was listening to them.

For a band that has more than twenty years of existence, they showed that they have something left in the tank. If you are a fan of bands like Watchtower, Blind Illusion or Matthias Steele then you will certainly like this. As for me, I felt like that was way too progressive and not enough thrash to make a significant impact. This isn't an album that I would listen to everyday, but it will appeal to a certain audience.