Legacy of Hate (Legacy Of Hate - Celesty)

Member Name: Frankingsteins

Product:	Legacy Of Hate - Celesty
Date:	25/04/08 (47 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: More ambitious.

Disadvantages: Still uses other bands' ideas.

Celsty's second album is a refinement of their first, but one that only manages to sound even more like the other fantasy-themed power metal bands out there. The most direct comparison would be Dragonland, thanks to the prominence of keyboard orchestration and the closing title suite, but the overall sound is an incredibly generic one, taking its influence from the genre as a whole. While this makes for a consistent and experienced-sounding album, it also offers nothing new to genre fans.

The most striking element here really is desperately contrived, and comes in the form of rasped vocals from guests Sami Kaste and Aku Rahkonen in 'Breed From the Land Unknown.' While this makes the song stand out more than it would already, with its comparatively memorable guitar work, it's a cheap gimmick that doesn't really work in context, just as every other power metal band that attempts to involve death/black metal vocals ends up failing (Adagio's 'Dominate' album was plagued by them, but Children of Bodom, Norther and Kalmah have somehow made careers out of it).

The other intrusive element here is the operatic grandeur that first rears its head in the distinctly Rhapsody-esque keyboards and vocals of 'Army of the Universe,' culminating in the overlong and over-repetitive 'Legacy of Hate,' which is twenty minutes long in total but is far from a power metal epic, more along the lines of long Edguy songs that repeat a chorus ad nauseam.

1. Intro
2. Unbreakable
3. Dream
4. Breed From the Land Unknown
5. Army of the Universe
6. Settlement
7. Shelter
8. Legacy of Hate (Part 1)
9. Legacy of Hate (Part 2)

Summary: Celesty's second album (2004).