REFLECTIONS OF THE I

I'm no expert and I won't claim this as my favorite album or anything. I thought someone should put something down for this album as it's a good one and worthy of note. This album consists of 2 separate recordings, "Reflections of the I" and the EP "Of Entity and Mind". I would actually rate "Reflections of the I" by itself as a 3 because most of the truly stand-out tracks are found on the EP. The melody to "Mirrored in Time" just about has me in tears when I hear it.

The sound is mid-paced minimalist heavy metal riffs interspersed with brilliant classical piano and strings. My understanding is that this group is mainly the project of the keyboardist, Andy Winter, so the emphasis on the keyboards makes sense. The drums, guitar, and keys all are performed flawlessly. As for bass, it's basically an afterthought, only there because it's supposed to be. You never really hear it. The music can be a little jerky as one riff simply dissolves into another with little thought given to transitions. The album seems to be some sort of concept about discovering oneself within the universe but honestly I never bothered to read too deeply into it so I couldn't tell exactly what's going on. The melodies are very good if a bit spare.

Then there's the vocals. Probably the weakest of the "instruments" in this group, I've heard plenty of complaints about the voice. Lars Eric Si doesn't have a voice that most people would consider a lead voice; he sings mid-range and doesn't sound especially powerful. He's certainly competent at what he does. Personally, I think his sound works for this group for one reason. The concept,being especially personal, works with a voice like you'd hear from an average person, not punctuated by falsetto or awash in reverb. It's the sound of yourself inside your own head, and that's what the music is supposed to be about.

To sum up, this is neo-classical metal, only instead of being pretentious, it's more minimalist. It's simple and personal, but performed with high skill.