Vain Glory Opera

by

Edguy

Edit

"The inofficial but until now only true successor of Helloween's 'Keeper Of The 7 Keys' - milestones whose success Helloween couldn't achieve again after recognizing that they were at a commercial dead-end." So far the latest prereview of EDGUY's "Kindom Of Madness" published in the German 'Evil Message Magazine'. But it would be very unfair to call those 4 guys from Fulda (Germany) a simple "Helloween-copy". With their ability to write catchy songs which will stick to the listener's ears, the 4 guys (average age: 18 years!) have already got something what many musicians will never achieve.

At the latest after listening to the 18-minute track "The Kingdom" which deals with the Inquisition and the suffering and burning of many innocent people, the slightest rise of critique is mortified. It's hard to imagine that 18-years old greenhorns would be capable of writing such a song. "The Kingdom" does not act boring or tiring, because it lives from fast, harmonized lead lines and also from expressive and emotional lead vocals.

The icing on the cake was the co-operation with "True Metal" defender Chris Boltendahl, vocalist of Grave Digger. Altogether the song provides a contrastive atmosphere, romantic on the one hand, medieval and gruesome on the other. Those bombastic songs should drive Metalfans crazy.

EDGUY are a refreshing young band who don't trim their sails to the wind and follow the roots of sounds that were topical in their kindergarten days. EDGUY wanted to use these already existing stylistic elements which have impressed them since the days of their predecessors and to give the sum of those elements something unique by using mainly elements of an extreme form : driving power and anthem-like melodies.

Some words of Tobias Sammet / Edguy (singer, bass player & main songwriter):

"Right, all you enthusiastic or flabbergasted listeners. Call us Old Metal, True Metal, Soft Metal, Rock or Pop band. We can live with all these names. We make the music about whose supposed death (Metal-) journalists have already cracked their brains and haven't found a result yet, music that will make some people happy, others may be slandering about it. Some tracks on "Kingdom Of Madness" might be compared to what some people call 'Teutonic Melodic Metal of the 80s'. We know that we haven't developed a new revolutionary style but our songs come straight from the heart - the honest way. We make good songs with some great melodies and such songs will always live, also in other music genres than Metal."

There is nothing more to add, only that I am very much convinced, the band will make their way because who of us was so self-confident like these guys do in their age to follow their aim so consequently? At least not me!

Based on the strength of Avantasia (which in itself is pure brilliance), I decided to reach into the roots of Edguy. VGO isn't bad at all, although at times it can seem a little dated to say the least. For example, the title track 'Vain Glory Opera' reminds me of Europe's 'Final Countdown' with those same trumpet keyboard intro's, and it just makes me want to hit the 'skip' button on the CD player. Also, Tobias Sammet's singing style definatley changed later for Avantasia (where the similarity to Bruce Dickinson is even more obvious). On VGO however, his singing vibrato is a little more 'jagged' and so his unintentional impression of Fergal Sharkey (The Undertones) is rather hysterical. If you don't know The Undertones, think 'tropical bird mating call'.

Here is the key selling point though: "Out of Control". This is a great track that melds power crunch riffs with harmonious singing melodies. Of course the real treat on this track is the appearance of Hansi Kursch (Blind Guardian) who, in my opinion, has the most unique voice out there in power metal. Amazingly, Hansi only sings one line in each chorus but it complements the song like you wouldn't believe. It is such a shame that Hansi did not return to appear on Avantasia...

In any case, VGO is ok, and some of the other tracks like 'Until We Rise Again' and 'Walk On Fighting' help carry things along. However, this album showcased the beginnings of the band, and fortunatley they've since improved. So if you wanted to hear Edguy or Tobias Sammet, go for the throat and get Avantasia - the 'Metal Opera' puts them in the same ranks as the big guns (Seventh Son, Mindcrime etc).