Review Summary: KISS is one of the most hated bands in rock, and this album does not help their case.
There are many reasons why KISS appeals to me. They write amazing songs, they’re truly great musicians, and their theatrics heavily appeal to me. Being a KISS fan isn’t the greatest, many other musicians and music lovers despise this band. But I always wondered why. What can drive someone to hate them so much? They’re like the Nickleback of classic rock when looking at how hated these guys are. Even though their fan base is incredible huge, the population of people who hate them is equally as big- if not bigger. I ask people “Why do you hate them?” The most common answers are “They’re horrible musicians” and “That Elder album.” But if you truly look at these two aspects, they can actually be lumped together. How? Well because despite its horrid reputation, Music from “The Elder” proves to listeners that these guys aren’t terrible musicians. They have the ability to play more complex stuff. But does that help this album’s case? Kind of…
For starters I will say this. It’s an okay album, just not a KISS album. I consider KISS’ best albums to be Rock and Roll Over, Creatures of the Night, Dressed to Kill, and Hotter Than Hell so I guess I can consider myself your traditional KISS fan, but I’m also open minded about when they try to do something that is a deviation from their classic style. For example, I love Unmasked and I think Dynasty is a pretty good album. I also consider some of the albums they released in the mid-80’s to be fantastic, such as Lick It Up and Asylum. Hell, their grunge album Carnival of Souls: The Final Sessions is pretty decent. But concept fantasy rock? Not really.
The story of this album is really bland and I couldn’t care enough about this boy who has to somehow prove how he is a future hero that will save the world. So already, there’s a weak point of the album is gone. Let’s compare this to Operation: Mindcrime by Queensryche. The story is very intriguing and even though it might not be perfect (don’t get me on how many plot holes there are) as a listener, I really get fascinated by the characters and conflict. The Elder is your average “boy in a Fantasy world who is taken from his small village life to becoming hero of the kingdom” type story, something that wears old after a while. It’s what you’d expect from songwriters who wrote Love Gun, a badass tune about straight up sex.
The music and instrumentals on the album is mixed. You have a batch of songs that hit really and can be placed alongside NWOBHM bands of the time such as Iron Maiden and Diamond Head, songs like I, Only You, and The Oath fall under this category. But then you have other songs that are just weird, such as Odyssey and Fanfare which are fully orchestrated and sound like a movie soundtrack. It’s just weird. Then you have the last bunch of songs which fall in between these categories, like Just a Boy, Mr. Blackwell, and A World Without Heroes. To be quite honest, there’s a lack of consistency on this album and I think that’s its biggest downfall. It’s either hard and heavy, mellow and epic, or poppy and just plain weird.
It’s hard to explain what the problem with this album is, but if I could try to find one, it’s that its inconsistent and you’re just left wanting to hear KISS fully go back to their hard rock and heavy metal style. This was an amazing time in metal! The New Wave of British Heavy Metal was in full gear as Iron Maiden was gaining the masses and Def Leppard wasn’t overproduced and sugary. Hair/Glam metal was on the verge of breaking out, Motley Crue was to release their first album Too Fast For Love and it kicked ass! KISS could have really put out something to revitalize their career at this time, but no. They decided to try a gimmick, and not only that, but a gimmick that was considered outdated by that time. People grew tired of overly progressive and concept based music, why do you think new wave was so huge. For God sakes, Rush wasn’t even doing that kind of stuff anymore, they moved on to Moving Pictures that same year- their (debatably) best album. KISS really screwed up here and they were a bit too late trying to play catch up with the release of their best non 70’s record, Creatures of the Night which rivals that of Rock and Roll Over, Destroyer, and their first three albums. In short, The Elder- while having some redeeming qualities- was a horrible mistake that KISS made and is only an okay record.
