Lance King is no stranger to the citizens of power/prog metal´s magical kingdom. He´s done albums with renown acts such as Balance of Power and Pyramaze as well as owning Nightmare Records. He was brilliant with said bands, and his voice is pretty damn great, laden with power, sounding dramatic and having a superior range. So for his first solo venture he gathered his buddies in Anubis gate, aforementioned Pyramaze and Spheric Universe Experience and slammed together a pretty damn solid slab of melodic progressive power metal, not unlike what you´ve heard him do before.

A Moment in Chiros draws heavily on Pyramaze and Balance Power. Both the intro and Awakening could´ve been pulled straight out of the awesome Legend of the Bone Carver, in other words, especially Awakening kicks ass. Riffs are loaded with hooks, with the King himself firmly at the helm, commanding the ebb and flow with his distinct and catchy vocal lines. This is the general cosensus throughout the entire album, which highlights a rather important point.

The main, major pitfall of solo projects is the extremely narrow focus on the main man. How often do you actually listen focused and dedicated through a guitar hero album? I understand that vocals are different, but shifting the focus towards other aspects of the music is extremely important to avoid an unbearable monograph. Ironically, Kim Olesen of Anubis Gate handles the guitars, bass and keys, but the riffs plays a major part in this play. Sure Lance steals a lot of the glory, but when the melodies weaken and the catchiness fade, the riffs, drums, and great atmosphere created by the keys holds the ground brilliantly. The guitars are always huge and dramatic, keys always majestic and the drums continously blazing.

Progressively speaking, the songs tend to shapeshift a bit. The proper example of this is the title-track which, epic as it is, starts out with spoken word, flows into a ballad-land, takes a darker turn and then surges into pure awesomeness. A Moment in Chiros isn´t staright-forward power metal. The songs rarely trickle into neverland, nor do they resemble one another much which is where this kind of music tend to utterly fail nowadays. Songs like the mentioned title-track, Awakening, Dance of Power, and Infinity Divine are textbook examples on how to do melodic metal nowadays. Great stuff, highly recommended!