Metal Reviews

the cd is much better than the review makes it out to be, but the instrumentals do get boring...

What a fucking terrible review. "I'm gonna give this a 60 because the songs are too technical and I can't handle it, I want simple song structures and catchy choruses."

:roll:


One of the worst reviews I've read from this site, by far.

Then you might be shocked looking back to the first months of reviews ;)

On the subject, I've not heard the album yet, so I can't judge. I only think it's strange that Danny doesn't defend his review here, but perhaps he's bussy or away or something.

One more thing, this is a review handled by a person who gave Fear Factory's Archetype a 95, and Killswitch Engage's The End of Heartache a 92, and has never even reviewed a progressive metal album, and that has some sort of personal problem with Dream Theater.


What were you thinking, metalreviews.com?

Metalreviews.com is a collective, Danny reviewed the album, not metalreviews.com.

And gave Cryptopsy a 40, rated the raw black metal act Antaeus (he thought it was death metal) a 1 for their more or less legendary album "Cut Your Flesh And Worship Satan" (and misspelled it in the title of the review), rated Korn 85 etc etc. But I think that was all very long ago, when lots of us (well me for sure) knew even less about metal. I think it's unfair to blame him for that, I'm not going to let you read my first reviews ;)

Then shouldn't someone that specializes in prog metal, or that at least likes it handle the review?

I personally really think people should only review in the genres of their liking, to make a fair comparison to other albums in the range. But that's just me, I have no problem with people that think that is not so.

I agree 100%. This should be the case if the review site is to be truthfully accurate. Ideally, that would serve their readers in the best possible way.

Unfortunately this presents some logistical nightmares because the various reviewers would need to be in constant communication to be sure the proper albums got to the right guy/gal.

Say reviewer Sid is a total extreme metal fanatic, while reviewer Ted is into old school and progressive. When Sid gets a copy of Rage - Speak of the Dead, he can tell from first listen that he's not going to like this at all. Too much symphony crap and wussy mellow singing. So he makes sure Ted gets a copy either thru snail mail or file sharing, because the album does deserve a fair shake. So Ted gets it on his end, and he absolutely loves the orchestral instrumentals on the album, and he thinks the second half is classic Rage. Ted writes a review calling it a 90 while Sid would have given it a 50.

This is doing the readers a great service. Because now when a visitor scans through that week's reviews all lined up in a column, that score of 90 will stand out to him/her and they will click through to the review. Whereas with Sid having given it a 50, that visitor passes right over a truly great album because if the score is the lowest one of the bunch, it must really suck and not worth wasting time on.

Completely agreed.

But Danny is a big Rage fan, so it would make sense that he reviews it. I think you guys are making something out of nothing here. Danny didn't like this album, but he's not the only one. Mike also is a big Rage fan and he said this album sucks. His words, "this album sucks." I feel the orchestral crap in the beginning does ruin the album for people, but maybe I'm wrong? Would you not be more critical of the second half of a book if you thought the first half sucked even though the second half was really good? Probably.

I do think Danny's expectation of something more like Unity and Soundchaser maybe made him a little too quick to judge, but he is a fan of the band and therefore this notion of him not being the right reviewer to review this album is a little off the mark. His opinion differs and comes off a bit less objective as maybe it should be, but I think the current discussion is unnecessary.

The reviewers here review albums and genres they're familiar with.

But, you see, Eyesore, Danny being a fan of the band is exactly what irks me about the score of 60. I'll accept that 60 rating from him if he is truly comparing it to Unity and Soundchaser (or whatever his favorite Rage albums are). But he's not supposed to be doing that. You can't lose focus of the goal of this (or any) review website. Serve your customers well! A rating of 60 does not serve your customers well because from an uninformed visitor's point of view, this album sucks worse than 85-90% of all albums reviewed on this site. That's bullshit. That's wrong.

Maybe this is one of those instances where it would have been better for someone who wasn't a big fan of the band to review the album. We might have got a less biased review out of it.

Bias can be a good thing or a bad thing, it goes both ways sometimes and this review proves it!

I can't argue with that, I guess the only person who can set the record straight would be Danny, and I doubt he'll be posting here any time soon.

I'm pleased that the album was reviewed by Danny who is a long-time fan of the band. That way he could easily detect this was a sub-par album and rate it adequately and that way help new fans realize this is not one of the band strong albums. If SOTD was reviewed by someone who is not into the band he would score this even lower I think. And I'm sure Danny is a pro when it comes to writting reviews and being biased means nothing if he can judge an album by what it is rather than what it should have been.

I am a fan of this band but that doens't mean I should rate everything Rage does 80+ score. If they release a weak album I'm not going to bitch about it. I'm still a Rage fan and like their previous albums more.This release is weaker for Rage standarts and the score reflects that.

This is an album that's going to have people drawing lines. Just look at this thread. Danny doesn't like it much, nor do you, Mike thinks it sucks, but I think it's very good aside from the orchestral instrumentals, other people agree with me and actually like the instrumentals. The reviewer at Sea Of Tranquility likes the Suite better than the latter half of the album.

People are seriously divided over this one.

After having this for two weeks I'm pretty sure this is my favorite modern Rage album. I thought Soundchaser was brilliant and this one-ups it just by a little. It's more technical and more aggressive overall but the writing, as usual, is stellar.

Like most have said, whether they like it or love it, its ridiculous to give this a 60. It's far better than that rating. Don't rate your disappointment, rate the album. A 60 is an emotional score, let it sink in and review it with a level head.

Did you see the review for Gorguts-From Wisdom To Hate
and Impaled-The DeaD Shall Dead Remain? Now those are really really bad.

This album needed some time to grow on me, but in the end I came to appreciate it quite a lot. It's a bit different in style than Soundchaser, not quite so in your face. It's a bit more complex at parts.

Danny being a big Rage fan doesn't make him a suitable reviewer, if anything it would make him more biased (fanboyism, or disappointed-fanboyism). The fact of the matter is that bands changes their style, Rage has done so before on several occasions, and any album released by any band should be reviewed by a person who likes the style of the album (the music the band have attempted to create).
If the album itself fails to impress a person who likes it's style, be it Power-metal, Prog-metal or Black-metal then and only then does it deserve a low score. However, from reading the review written by Danny I got the impression that he was reviewing the style or the genre rather than the music itself, and that serves absolutely no purpose for any reader of the review.