Submit (Dominate - Adagio)

Member Name: Frankingsteins

Product:	Dominate - Adagio
Date:	25/10/07 (74 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Competent and enjoyable progressive power metal.

Disadvantages: A couple of terrible songs, and far too derivative of Symphony X.

The arrival of talented Brazilian vocalist Gustavo Monsanto signalled great things to come from Adagio, France’s answer to Symphony X, but unfortunately last year’s ‘Dominate’ failed to live up to their past glories. Gone are the impressive neoclassical elements for the most part, restricted to Stéphan Forté’s brief lead guitar passages in the style of Michael Romeo or a laid-back Yngwie J. Malmsteen, while Kevin Codfert’s keyboards now sound just about the same as every other power metal band that fancies itself as a bit progressive. One of the most noticeable and drastic changes is evident within the first minute of the album, as Monsanto’s pleasant mid-range singing gives way to one of the least effective death metal growls I’ve heard in a long time, as Adagio seemingly attempt to join the melodic death metal bandwagon despite sharing few other similarities besides a couple of particularly heavy passages in assorted songs that last for all of thirty seconds.

I’m being a bit harsh on this album, essentially a collection of quite enjoyable modern metal songs, but it’s because it disappointed me so much. Adagio’s ‘Underworld’ was an excellent release that combined the usually pretentious and tedious neoclassical metal genre with genuinely powerful and enjoyable prog metal in the vein of America’s Symphony X, but here that band’s influence is allowed to dominate (ironically), the only release being in the more traditionally power metal songs that owe equally to Brazil’s Angra and to older artists such as Dio. Note those names down if you didn’t know them already, and hunt their albums down, after which you can return to this as a sort of disappointing epilogue. Beginning as a seemingly straightforward prog-power album in the vein of Angra, something that wouldn’t have been entirely unpleasant, the rest of the songs tend towards blatant Symphony X forgery that are, at their best, effective but inferior copies of the real deal, and at their worst churn out a couple of cheesy eighties rock ballads. There’s even a pointless cover of Irene Cara’s ‘Fame’ that departs from the original in all but the vocal melody, yet doesn’t do anything interesting with the song (you know, THAT ‘Fame.’ Yeah, the eighties thing. No, not that one, that’s ‘Gold’ you’re thinking of, this is that other one that’s pretty much the same as that. Yeah, that one).

1. Fire Forever
2. Arcanas Tenebrae/Dominate
3. Terror Jungle
4. Children of the Dead Lake
5. R’Lyeh the Dead
6. The Darkitecht
7. Kissing the Crow
8. Fame
9. Undying [Japanese bonus track]

The first song is really good, even if it’s nothing new. A relatively straightforward power metal anthem permitted to mess around a little towards the end with some guitar noodling and a cool solo, this song is a great introduction for new vocalist Monsanto, even if his growls are a little distracting and unpleasant. His default range is great, booming in the middle like his finest contemporaries, and he has a good singing voice too, so it’s a shame he doesn’t use it more. Like most simple metal songs, this is mainly remembered for the enjoyable chorus in which Monsanto wails the title against a barrage of fast and nicely developed instrumentation, there really isn’t anything to fault this track as an album opener. The semi-title track is another good effort, although a little long, in which the heavier elements come to the fore with greater reliance on growled vocals and double bass drums complete with some blast beats and what the band imagines are black metal keyboard melodies. It’s a little confused, seemingly trying to earn praise for being heavier than it actually is in the style of many melodeath bands, but once again it’s the chorus that stays with the listener as they try to type a review afterwards, this time performed in the medium range to suit the slightly darker tone.

It’s with the third track that the album starts to disappoint by relying too much on its influences and essentially throwing out a number of songs that could be considered Symphony X B-sides. The way the drums and guitars hammer out clinically precise rhythms in perfect time with each other before giving way to a keyboard melody is taken straight from Symphony X, and even the main riff, once it develops, reminds me completely of that band around the period of the ‘V’ album, released six years earlier. This song is notable for a cool bass lead section, in which Franck Hermanny seems intent to prove his credentials by playing a number of unusual high notes before returning to his back seat, but once everything settles down into verses and choruses the style once again shifts into what I can’t help but identify as 90s Dio, using the same slowed, near-doom heavy riffs and vocal style as the former Black Sabbath frontman. Perhaps realising that there’s nothing left to lose, the band then transform into 80s Dio for ‘Children of the Dead Lake,’ though this more upbeat song is more interesting for its instrumental sections in the second half, culminating in a speedy piano ditty in the vein of Rimsky Korsakov’s ‘Sting of the Bumblebee,’ only less fun.

Perhaps the stand-out track of the album, though not quite my favourite, is also the last point at which the album is really worth listening to. The epic ‘R’Lyeh the Dead’ begins with yet another dingy keyboard intro, though this time extended as a proper introduction for this eight-minute piece, complete with what are probably synthesised violins but still sound very nice, before a dirty guitar crawls up into the tomb and unleashes the heaviest riffs of the album, accompanied by a steady and enjoyable drum beat. The reason this song works where track three failed is that the heavy sound here is a natural development of the band’s standard tone, rather than a blatant failed attempt to sound like death metal, although Monsanto does growl predominantly once again. The majority of the song is enjoyable and suitably demonic, excepting the light and cheerful keyboard solo that Codfert decided was a good idea to include for some reason or other, while the last few minutes are another chance for the band to show off within reason, and according to taste. It’s a little too long, but this is an enjoyable song that keeps the album from being a complete failure; it’s just a shame that everything afterwards is of little value.

‘The Darkitecht’ follows a similar formula to the rest of the album, beginning slowly with a section that seems to draw directly on Black Sabbath’s 1970 title song (Note: If you’re thinking of ripping something off and hope nobody will notice, don’t pick the very first metal song ever recorded), but the rest is the usual Symphony X worship, complete with a keyboard solo overlaid on top of an instrumental jam that could come from pretty much any of their early recordings. The fade out at the end would act as a form of relief, if not for the horror of the next song: ‘Kissing the Crow’ is without a doubt the worst song here and shatters the mould completely, a short piano ballad with soft singing that robs Monsanto of all his charm. After that comes the infamous cover of ‘Fame,’ unrecognisable until the chorus comes in and Monsanto delivers the well-known lines in a disinterested manner. There might be a guitar solo or something, I don’t really care. Many versions of the album conclude with the bonus track ‘Undying,’ which fits perfectly into the sound of the album and even tends a little more towards the power metal direction of the opening song, though by this point I was too fatigued and disillusioned by the preceding offerings to enjoy this average extra as much as I perhaps would otherwise.

I’d strongly advise against buying Adagio’s most recent album, not that any of you were going to anyway, and instead aim to track down their excellent ‘Underworld’ or perhaps the more highly rated albums of the bands they seem content to steal from, namely Angra’s ‘Temple of Shadows’ and anything from Symphony X. Gustavo Monsanto proves that he’s a great vocalist when he’s not trying too hard to sound angry, and Stéphan Forté has proven his guitar abilities many times, so I’m hopeful that this album doesn’t represent the start of a downturn for these otherwise impressive Gauls.

Summary: Adagio's fourth album (2006).