MABOOL - THE STORY OF THE THREE SONS OF SEVEN

When I discovered this site a few years ago, I started to download as much mp3 as I could from here. The plan was to have all of the material here, on progarchives, burned on blank cd's, but as I found this idea to be quite stupid, I stopped after burning two ''prog-metal from Progarchives'' mp3-discs. These became very informative though and basically gave start to my prog-metal collection. There were very many artists and songs that cought my ear on these self-made cd-s, Orphaned Land with the song 'Ocean Land' among others. Years later I decided to get the special edition of 'Mabool...' as it had a reasonable price. Now to the point...

It's a fine album, holding many values, as the interesting middle-eastern touch, great melodies here and there and a fitting concept, but there just isn't enough here for me to thouroughly enjoy 'Mabool...'. For one thing, the sound, production-wise, doesn't feel good at all, and this is probably one of the reasons the album gets annoying to listen for a longer period of time. It might be that the music is too 'concentrated' as well and that this eastern-influence is too strong for me to endure for more than a few songs. Anyway, there are good points to the album, but they seem to show themselves better on particular songs, such as 'Ocean Land'. Many songs seem just pointless and dull, uninspired.

The concept is all religion(-mythology)-oriented, but doesn't bother me at all, as some Neal Morse texts usually do.

In comparison to other bands, I find that Orphaned Land is very similar to Therion, as the opera-choir-parts and general atmosphere have quite the same 'feel' in my oppinion. They have a lot in common with Green Carnation and Angra as well. I feel that Orphaned Land doesn't resemble Opeth in many ways at all, except for the use of death-metal vocals (which are very different with the two as well) and for the fact that obviously both can be classified as prog-metal. Style-wise, Orphaned Land mostly plays music with power-, melodic-death-metal, and middle-east folk influences and the mix works quite well.

So, if you find Therion, Green Carnation and Angra to be bands you enjoy very much, this cd would fit you very well I deem, but fans of bands like Opeth should wary.

For a conclusion, I'd say that though I found many enjoyable moments in 'Mabool', I feel that it's simply good, but not in any way excellent or anything near 'masterpiece' status.

Honestly I'd rate this good effort a bit better than 3 stars but feel that it's not worthy of 4. So, let's say 3.5, leaning closer to 3, if you please.

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