I admit I have never liked Orden Ogan much. I remember the hype around their breakthrough Easton Hope way back in 2010 and then just being underwhelmed by it. Since then, the songs I have heard confirmed my estimation of this as another overproduced, underwritten Power Metal band like Twilightning or Stratovarius—a band with more flash than substance. So I was not sure if I would find their eighth album to be egregiously worse, or if they would have improved over the years.
I am glad to find they have actually gotten better. Oh, sure, this is still way overproduced, presenting a glossy, overloaded sound that fans of slick modern metal sounds will eat up, but the songwriting underneath has actually gotten pretty good. The first three songs in particular are ace workouts in melodic, heavy, rather complex music that will get your head banging nicely. The playing is tight and the guitar work is especially tasty, even if the whole is so overwrought it makes it hard to pick out individual sounds. Even vocalist Sebastian Levermann has so many tracks of his voice stacked up you can barely tell what he sounds like underneath it all.
But I can't lie and say I don't like this album when I do. It may be emblematic of an overly commercial, overly polished impulse among Power Metal bands to make something they could maybe go on Eurovision with, and it may not have anything that sounds underground or subversive, but it's still a lot of fun. If you like Battle Beast, Unleash the Archers, or Powerwolf, then you won't go wrong with this one.
