THE PERFECT ELEMENT - PART 1

I wasn't too thrilled by the first two Pain of Salvation albums, and to be honest I've never altogether warmed up to them, but I have to admit that on The Perfect Element Part 1 the disparate parts of their sound come together as cohesively as they have ever done. Drawing from a wider range of metal influences than is typical for a progressive metal band - there's even points, as on Used, where things begin to sound a bit like Faith No More (particularly when it comes to the Mike Pattonish vocals and the groove metal riffs) - still, there's enough more traditionally proggy elements to the album to keep most prog fans happy.

A lot of the time I think Pain of Salvation's occasionally goofy lyrics and concepts overshadow their music, but that certainly isn't the case here - and in presenting a radically less showboaty and cheesy vision of prog metal than the genre's giants in Dream Theater do, the band have done a lot to help the genre's sound emerge from the shadow of Images and Words, even if their particular blend isn't to my liking.