In Silence They March

Second effort for this Power Metal band and it seems that they still haven't heard of a thing called : PRODUCTION !!! It's a shame to have such a fucked up production nowadays... and I can't understand how a label can tolerate this... anyway. As unbelievable as it may seems, the production is even worse than the first one, and so is the general feeling of the whole album. The band lack originality for one thing, but that is tolerable to a certain point. The singer is quite lousy, except when he makes excellent high pitched screams "à la" Kai Hansen. I think Crystal Eyes are talented enough to make much better than the 2 albums that they've done so far.... unfortunately something is missing. Their music is supposed to be epic. Supposed because they somehow miss the turn and crash themselves into a wall, the melodies are too happy childish la-la-la, the kind ones to be likely used to promote a new chocolate bar for children with lot of milk inside or something... The main problem is probably to mix excellent power metal riffs with these happy melodies in the chorus... they simply won't go together. But sometime the overall mix is screwed and it feels like everything is out of tune. Guitars are saving the day, just like the first album, both riffs and solos are pretty cool and nicely played. The drums are also an area that they can develop, especially the sound of them, but then again we fall into the production problem of this album. As for the music, you can feel a lot of good influences from Gamma Ray, Heaven's Gate and Helloween early years. In the end the best thing, like for the first album, is the excellent artcover (although a bit static). I guess that if they work on the vocals, try to get loose of the sometimes ridiculous melodies, and focus their attention into building songs around good riffs and epic choirs, they might become a cool band, but today there are too many things that are out of sync or tune if you prefer... the sound and production being the first one. But on some moments they show sparks of ingenuity, so there's hope. C'mon guys, you are able to do much better than this... and that all I wish for. But first of all, find a decent producer.