Review Summary: METAL RAMPAGE
Progressive power metal has potential to include a roster of bizarre, untamed bands, and the reasons are obvious. By combining the two genres, you’ll get the ridiculous wankery of progressive metal, and also the excessive cheese found in power metal. It is a match made in heaven, or hell, depending on your musical preference. How does this relate to Pagan’s Mind? Well, Pagan’s Mind always had the potential to go bonkers, and in
God’s Equation they did just that. Being about as proggy and powery (yeah I made up those words) as the human mind can handle, this is easily their most bizarre album. The band was always a bit out there with their nerdy lyrics and alien soundscapes, so why not go all out? It turns out that going a bit crazy was just the thing the band needed.
God’s Equation could be described as a metal freak-out. Every song is flooded with insane guitar riffs, riffs so outstandingly technical it’s a wonder how their guitarist can play any of the songs live (but he can, and he does it perfectly). The band also amped up distortion to bone-shaking levels, the ploy works well in their favor. However, some things do not work as well, such as the lead singer’s attempts at growls, or the gang vocals tossed in songs – it is thankful that they are only occasional nuisances. Generally, Pagan’s Mind’s attempt at being more metal is achieved with flying colors; the album is a head banger if ever there was one.
With their technical instrument playing as well as the distortion factor being turned up, it follows that their sci-fi sounds are more prevalent than ever. The keyboardist is at his best, belting out alien synth lines and spacey atmospherics in the most obvious geek attack yet. He’s also playing to a higher level with the synths used just as often and technically as the guitar work, it’s even difficult to tell the two instruments apart when one after the other burst out with solos. So what happens when the band’s technical metal and alien soundscapes collide? Absolute chaos happens. The album has a bad case of ADHD and the amount of ridiculous riffs will surely drive you insane. If one wanted to commit mass murder, they would only have to get a bunch of old people in the same room and then play this album on the loudest setting – seizures galore! Yes, this is Pagan’s Mind’s greatest album so far and is even quite hard to beat in the progressive metal scene, but will the band ever surpass
God’s Equation? Only time machines can tell.
