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Good review.

The Black Halo is amazing, but I've listened to this album 2-3 times now and not much seems to stick, everything just kind of blends.
I might be of an other opinion in time but as of now I'd rate this album about 75/100. Quite good, but not fantastic.

I actually thought this was pretty bad (for Kamelot). It is so slow, plus I've never been a huge fan of Roy's vocals. So when they do the slower songs that are more focused on Roy's voice I can't help but cringe. It did take me a while to get into The Black Halo though, so maybe with time...

This is a much weaker album than their past 3 releases, but still a solid album. A weaker album from Kamelot is still a very strong release. Mourning Star, Love you to Death, Ghost Opera, and Edenecho are all amazing songs. There's just no song that compares to what was on TBH.

75/100.

i'm a bit disappointed with this album.

The Black Halo was slower but very, um, "rich" sounding, an excellent album. this is still slow and even if the great effects are still present here and there, it sounds poorer than the previous albums, besides Khan's excellent voice, especially after "Blücher".

i miss the galloping rhythm the band had before, and the slightly more upbeat sound.

the first half is solid, but after Blucher the only songs that really stuck with me were Edenecho and Silence of the Darkness (nice choruses, otherwise nothing special compared to what the band has done before).

also "Anthem" is absolutely awful. ugh.

EDIT - Ness, Khan is infinitely better than that Vanderbilt guy. i don't think i've ever heard anyone prefer the old singer. or do you dislike both of them?

I've never heard the old singer. I've only heard Khan for Kamelot.

Yeah I agree. For me the album sitll has all of Kamelot's awesome sounds (the awesomely used orchestra, Roy's voice, the riffs), but the songs on Ghost Opera are really weak... they needed to be longer or more memorable or something.

Does anyone else think of Kamelot as a power metal band for non-power metal fans? They're the only band in the genre that I've heard fans of like indie, or even people who listen to other metal subgenres but not power metal praise... but at the same time most people who hear them after knowing a lot about power metal seem to think they're overrated.

I would actually say Dragonforce would be the band for people who don't like power metal.

Some of my friends who don't even like metal dig Kamelot.

I haven't heard it yet so I won't be making an opinion right now but despite the comments here I'm still waiting in anticipation for this.

That is so true.Yesterday my friend and I were browsing a department store and saw a couple emo kids wearing Dragonforce shirts.I am no fashion designer but anybody not blind or from another panet could see the clashing styles.We enjoyed a hearty laugh later in the parkinglot as we blasted some brutal death and glared at the Jehova's Witness.

Interesting review,I look forard to giving this a listen.

Again like with all of their releases, Kamelot do not underestimate the listener, which I think is one reason why they are kind of an oddity amongst power metal bands, and indeed amongst music in general. I hope they will continue in the same musical direction in the future (backing away from that whole industrial sound though).
As for the individual songs I actually liked every single song on the album (including Anthem) as they were all interesting, but I cannot think of any standouts.

What I am waiting for from Kamelot is that shamelessly ambitious 79+ minutes album with a 15+ minutes closing track.

That's what I hope for from every band I'm just biased towards long/ambitious songs

Why so much praise for The Black Halo ? Their breakthrough album ? barely so. Epica was much more ..Epic for lack of words and had the most killer songs (Center of the universe, Edge of paradise, Descent of the Archangel, Farwell ...). Black Halo was good but nothing special.

I'll be definitely looking out for their new release when it comes out, as they are one of my favorite bands.

That's simply put the best review for this album.I think in a couple of words you've also concentrated all my thoughts on this.
The galloping sound is exactly what's missing here in the first place.But yeah,the songs are still cool.Still the second part is also missing some interesting moments so it's leaning towards dull all in all (this part I mean).Actually I think Anthem is an ok ballad,but strange lyrics.
I love the solo on "Love you to death",too bad I suck at ear training coz I would've loved to play it too.
So for sure it's weaker than TBH which was a huge album and it totally blew me away,but the vibe is still on,it's just the level of intensity that suffers.
Would kill to see them live,but oh well...no chances yet where I live.

While I have not heard the entire album I have heard 2 full songs and short clips of the rest of them. From what I have heard it sounds very 'light' and non-heavy. The guitars sound barely audible in the mix. Absolutely no Balls at all. I am surprised nobody has brought that up yet. Am I the only one hearing this?

Of course I know Kamelot has never been the heaviest band or anything but I do own 'TBH' and it seems to have the standard amount of crunch in the guitars as most metal out nowadays. But this album does not even sound metal to me at all. I doubt if I were to play this for a non-metal fan that they would classify this as metal either. Where as they probably would categorize there previous albums as Metal.

I don't understand bands or fans in the metal genre that like real flowery or light sounding metal? Why are they even playing or listening metal if they don't like for lack of a better term 'heaviness'?

Anyway not ripping on Kamelot or anything just what it sounded like to me. I did enjoy there previous release quite a bit but this is definately not for me....

Peace....

Quite surprised there's such a lot of negativity about this release, guess I'm in the minority then. Just did a quick scan over google and so far all the reviews bar one I found were extremely positive so at least I'm not alone from a critical standpoint.

grandbazaar:- personal opinion, I preferred the black Halo to anything else they've done and praised it as such. Feel free to disagree but that's all the reasoning I need. As for breakthrough I was referring to it as the album that put them on the radar to the everyday metal fan, they were well known to the underground well before then, but the Black Halo was their first impact on the mainstream metal consciousness and thus when a lot more people got exposed to the band and conversely their back catalogue.

Metal Marc:- I think we listened to different albums and / or have very different ideas of what constitutes metal. The guitars on the copy I have are clearly audible and several of the riffs, rule the world or The Human Stain for example, are among the heavier things the band have attempted, at least to my ears. If you listened to this album from start to finish and then turned round to me and said it isn't metal, there'd be an awful lot of stuff which would then be labeled the same, metal would become a rather small genre I think.

I guess I like this one more than mostly everyone. Its not amazing, nor near the level of the albums from Fourth Legacy to Black Halo, but it is still a very solid album. They particularly succeed in creating a dark atmosphere from beginning to end- just listen to Rule the World and especially the chorus of Ghost Opera. There are a few duds, particularly Anthem and parts of the Human Stain, but there still are very enjoyable songs after Blucher.. the songs from Love You to Death to Silence of the Darkness are all excellent, and provide some of the more overt metal missing from earlier parts of the album (particularly Silence of the Darkness). Overall, 82/100.

i like Epica more too because it has more fast paced songs... although I can understand the black halo being people's favourites.

I think Epica has the better songs, but Black Halo is more consistent. There are songs and interludes I always skip over when listening to Epica... But then there are songs like Center of the Universe, Descent of the Archangel and III Ways to Epica which are really the best Kamelot songs ever. While the Black Halo has no superfucktasticly amazing songs but everything on it is quality and I wouldn't take anything out.