SEVENTH SON OF A SEVENTH SON

After the ill-received attempt to open up their sound on Somewhere In Time, Maiden gave it one more brave try before encountering their final collapse. Nevertheless, 7th Son is the result of a band applying a formula to recreate their earlier glories, rather then the sound of musicians trying to challenge themselves.

The resulting creative slack can be heard on most songs. Infinite Dreams is a nasty piece of commercial sing-along pop-metal, with bad transitions, uninspired playing and all hard-rock clichés clutched together. But it gets worse, nothing tops Can I Play With Madness in ultimate cheesiness. In fact only 3 tracks come near to the height of their best material: the opening Moonchild, the 7th Son epic and the album closer Only The Good Die Young. They all feature adequate Maiden style-exercises. Also The Clairvoyant has a number of good moments, typically in the verses and the instrumental parts. Overall, the trivial choruses make this whole album too ordinary and even indigestible for me.

For many this is a power-metal classic so please feel free to try your luck. For me this is where a superfluous progressive pretension can't hide the lack of interesting ideas, with mostly predictable and commercial music as a result. 2.5 stars

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