RECREATION DAY

To achieve ultimate enjoyment of this album there must be prerequisites: 1. you like metal or heavy guitar riffs (in my locality, we call it as "jeg-e-jeg" emulating the riffs sound), 2. open mind. Otherwise, forget it! Don't bother about this album. For me personally, this is an excellent power metal album and I don't really care whether or not this album is prog. Let's say it's 90% power metal and the remaining 10% is up to you to judge. It can be considered as prog as it has some tempo changes as well. But man . this album BLEW me at first spin! I like the power, the heavy guitar riffs, the symphonic keyboard sound, screaming vocal (sometimes a bit growling - never mind; Pain of Salvation has done it a lot - but still OK right?). Most of all, the music is truly melodic! BUY IT NOW! (I plan to buy it as the CD with me is on loan basis from my prog metal colleague, David).

"The Great Deceiver" (I thought was a cover of King Crimson; it's not) blasts the album off with full power and speed of metal music! Yeah mannn .. it's metal!! The guitar fills accompanied with powerful bass line with double pedal bass drum open the track in perfect harmony. It is followed by screaming vocal. Keyboard sound plays a role as back sound during the vocal takes the lead. But when there is a change in tempo to a slower one, it accentuates the transition nicely (augmented with a vibe sound as well). I like the simple guitar riffs (well . it's typical metal song - but it's really cool .). The solo guitar is really stunning.

"End Of Your Days" starts of with ambient keyboard sound followed by speed guitar riffs and dynamic drumming. This track has a very nice interlude in moderate tempo (not in full speed) with stunning guitar solo backed with melodic keyboard sounds. This track reminds me to Symphony X music. The vocal is actually reminiscent of Symphony X vocalist (Russel Allen).

"As I Lie Here Bleeding" is a straightforward heavy metal / hard rock tune with nice piano touch, dazzling bass line. The vocal harmony is really nice even though the melody is repeated quite often. The title track "Recreation Day" seems like a prog metal music at the opening part. But I observe the keyboard sound at background creates a nuance of rather mellow music. The music moves into faster tempo with lead guitar melody but it then turns quieter with much melodic style in slow tempo. The ending part is dominated by keyboard sound in symphonic style.

"Visions" brings the music back into full power and speed. The guitar riffs are played softly when vocal line enters the music. But at the end of vocal passage the riffs turn heavier. Oh man . this is METAL!! This track brings your adrenalin exploded really! (especially having heard slow track before this). But the music than turns to a moderate tempo during interlude with stunning guitar solo. Keyboard sounds augment nicely during this passage. In this track I can hear heavy guitar riffs marry nicely with symphonic keyboard. "I'm Sorry " is a mellow track with nice melody, excellent lead guitar with some riffs. It flows to the next track "Blinded" in heavier mode with great keyboard sound and vocal line. Superb lead guitar. "Fragments" opens the track with simple guitar solo. When vocal line enters the tempo turns into moderate and moves back to faster one with guitar riffs, growling backing vocals. When the guitar takes the lead during interlude, the music turns like a heavy metal tune. This track has many tempo / melody changes. This is one of my favorite. It's really excellent.

"Madness Caught Another Victim" is a short track with excellent acoustic guitar rhythm and fills. Now the voice reminds me to the voice of David Coverdale of Deep Purple / Whitesnake. (Specifically, it reminds me to Coverdale / Vandenbergh acoustic live "Starkers in Tokyo").

"Your Darkest Hour" brings again the heavy metal spirit back on track. It's a nice straightforward rock tune. "Unforgivable" concludes the track in prog metal scene with great melody especially during slow passage with melodic voice line. This track confirms the symphonic nature of the band's music packaged in prog metal mood. The bonus track "Trilogy Of The Damned" is a nice mellow track.Excellent. It reminds me, somehow, with Dream Theater's "Space Dye Vest"; not in totality but in nuance. Sort of that ..

Highly recommended album! Rating: 4.25 / 5. GW, Indonesia.

Some people consider EVERGREY to be a death metal band because of its doom and gloom subject matter. I for one choose to call it progressive dark metal. Death and dying is certainly one of the grimmer realities that we face in the course of our existence on this planet.

With a title like "Recreation Day", this album sounds more like a day at the park playing Frisbee and having a picnic than a powerful Scandinavian metal unit flexing their musical muscles while plowing their way through each track with high volume fire branded guitar licks and a pounding rhythm section.

The lead singer Tom S. Englund has an imposing voice to match the energy and Gothic sound of the band. When you look at the track titles, it pretty much tells the story. "As I Lie Here Bleeding," "Your Darkest Hour" and "End Of Your Days" are dark and straight from the hip shots of cold hard reality. There is a murky corner in everyone's mind, it takes music like this to grab hold of it and give it absolution, and although it may seem scary, it sure is fun listening to such blood pumping sounds. This is yet another triumph for one of Europe's and the world's best prog-metal bands.

Evergrey fancies blending several metal influences together to create their music. To achieve this successfully, one must understand that Evergrey are first and foremost a Progressive Metal band. With this influence at the foundation of their music, they mix a little Power Metal before adding Atmospheric elements into the mix. Also, Evergrey are very good at including plenty of beautiful vocal harmonies, orchestrations and choirs which all adds to the overall experience.

This Swedish Progressive Metal band released their first album in 1998 and although Tom Englund is the only remaining original founding member of the band, he has managed to surround himself with top notch musicians in order to release one great album after another.

What to expect from this album?

The vocals are clear, soulful and dark. The lyrics are of the sensitive type. The rhythm section, the acoustic and electric guitars all sound great. The piano passages are beautiful. The guitar solos are beautiful. The harmonies and the melodies are beautiful. The fact that it is a Prog Metal album qualifies it as an essential listen for people who like this kind of music, but the mainstream masses will be missing out on ballads that are straight up rock classics, very easy to listen to.

Not only do you find stripped down piano passages on several of the tracks, there are a couple of stripped naked songs. One of them includes some acoustic guitars with Englund's voice and on another one we find Englund singing along with a solo piano accompaniment. The album is full of intricate musical arrangements yet it is accessible, powerful, emotional and dark, all at the same time. From full blown orchestrations to stripped down to basics music...it's all here and it's all so very, very good.

Some of my FAV lyrics:

"Madness caught another victim And the victim's name is blame"

"He used, abused, & he raped the trust The innocence of a life is lost Unforgivable sin"

Concluding Remarks:

Go into this album with an open mind, with no expectations at all. And don't expect to "get it" on the very first spin. Although there are plenty of satisfying moments to speak of, the whole album will sound so much better to you after several days of listening to it. Sometimes atmospheric and slow paced and sometimes bombastic and energetic, but simply a joy to get into!

Evergrey is among the bands that i like in prog metal so i'm trying to review another album of them. This album is good, but non-essential. After the superb and well done album In search of truth i have great expectation from this band. After some spins i find this is not better than previous one, but not bad. Maybe with more power twists than In search of truth and less prog elements. A 3 star album. Some forte tracks are End Of Your Days and Recreation days. Still can try this one, maybe you will find some great moments, after all is a 3 star album.

3.5 stars. For me this a step down from the excellent "In Search Of Truth" but better than "The Inner Circle". Actually it's kind of disappointing that from "In Search Of Truth" up to their latest release "Monday Morning Apocalypse" there seems to be a downward slope in the quality of music. This record is dark and heavy while still being quite melodic. I like it but there are several songs that just don't do it for me. I do like the emotional component that these guys bring to the table though.

"The Great Deceiver" is dark and heavy with a muddied sound. This one I don't really like a lot. "End Of Your Days" is better, especially the synth work. "As I Lie Here Bleeding" is one of the best songs on this record. It's an uptempo rocker with some fantastic guitar solos. "Recreation Day" is another tremendous tune.The topic is death and how in dealing with it we need to take time off (recreation day). This song has some nice piano, background vocals and blistering guitar solos. "Visions" continues the streak of great songs. This one features relentless drums, some good background synths, some major riffing, as well as tasteful guitar solos.

"I'm Sorry" is a cover of a song that was a hit in Sweden. It features keys and passionate vocals. Well done. "Blinded" is a heavy song with pounding drums, synths, and over the top guitar solos. "Fragments" is another highlight for me. It's a powerful song with ripping guitar solos. It sounds great. "Madness Caught Another Victim" is mainly acoustic guitar and passionate vocals. "Your Darkest Hour" is another incredible sounding tune.The vocals are well done and so are the background synths.The best part is the female vocal melody after 4 minutes. Beautiful. "Unforgivable" is about the Catholic church covering up abuse to children. Obviously a very emotional song. There is lots of crunch in the intro, followed by piano and vocals.This contrast continues."Trilogy of the Damned" is a bonus track and the longest track as well. For me it seems out of place, but it's a good song.

This is dark Swedish Metal that is fairly straight forward and often emotional.

Another solid album whose quality and rank in the band's catalogue may come down to a matter of taste. "Recreation Day" features a more powerful, sweeping sound than their excellent previous release, "In Search Of", which was a better demonstration of song- writing creativity. Take your pick... either way "Recreation Day" completely rocks!

"Great Deceiver" smashes down the door with its monstrous opening lick, while following songs keep the heat up just as nicely. This album is so energetic-- but especially Englund's terrific singing-- that the listener while likely find their mood changing from song to song (always the mark of a good rock album). As far as subject matter goes, "Recreation Day" is about as dreary as it gets, but that doesn't keep me from singing along with Englund's soaring voice and pumping my fists to the exciting riffing; fortunately, the band has thrown in enough lulls in the metal to keep the music from sounding repetitive. The rhythm section is as bland as ever though, but not boring enough to keep me from loving this album.

Just as good, but perhaps not as necessary as "In Search Of".

Songwriting: 3 Instrumental Performances: 4 Lyrics/Vocals: 4 Style/Emotion/Replay: 4

With Recreation Day Evergrey changed course. They started putting more emphasis on Melody and not so much on playing exciting things. A big mistake in my ears/ eyes. It´s not that I don´t like melody in metal, it´s just that I like the musicians to play something interesting under the melody. This quickly gets boring to me.

It starts out very well though with The Great Deceiver and End of Your Days which are probably the best songs here. Full metal assault ( not death/ black/ Grind of course) and no looking back. But quickly it turns from the more interesting thrashy riffs in the first couple of songs to a more simpel heavy metal direction not unlike the development we have also seen in Metallica´s music. This is such a shame ( in both cases) and Evergrey just doesn´t sound very good anymore. Sure there are riffs here and there that I like, but the overall feel is that of boredom.

The sound quality is not as good as the two previous albums either. It´s way more organic, and personaly I don´t like that in metal music. I like the cold precise sound they had on Solitude + Dominance + Tragedy and In Search of Truth.

Don´t get confused though when I tell you that this is not a poor album by any means. It´s very profesionaly played and composed, I just don´t like the direction Evergrey took with Recreation Day.

The few progressive tendencies the two previous albums had are nowhere to be found here, and my guess is that this album hold no interest for prog metal fans. Maybe more traditional heavy metal fans will like it. Who knows ? I just know that I don´t Particularly like it.

On Recreation Day, Evergrey's orchestral bombast and emotional singing are pushed to their limits but are carried by weaker songs then the previous albums.

Not all is bad, certainly not. There's still some stuff that should please the ardent fans but it's not enough. The album demonstrates how a pompous style like Evergrey's can shift from amazing to irritating over the course of just one album. Yes, compared to In Search of Truth, this is a big let down. Every Evergrey ingredient seems to be in place though: there's drama, dazzling playing, darkness, drama, soulful vocals, drama and drama. But they forgot one thing: convincing songs. Also the production can't charm me at all. Hyper-bombastic and overstated. The result is an overblown album that sounds as puffed up as any other power metal replica.

Evergrey's Recreation Day isn't a bad album, as such - it finds the band turning out competent progressive metal in a similar vein to the preceding In Search of Truth. However, In Search of Truth enjoyed the benefit of a much stronger central concept than the rather vague ideas about personal improvement and self-exploration that underpin proceedings here, and the comparative lack of a strong focus seems to be reflected in the compositions here as much as it is in the lyrics. The cheesier parts of Evergrey's sound get a bit more airtime, and some songs end up drifting into repetitive sections as though the band aren't sure how to develop their ideas further.

It's an enjoyable enough listen, but it's very forgettable, and it lacks the distinct flavour and atmosphere which gave In Search of Truth the edge.