Review: Trans-Siberian Orchestra live show

Even if you hate Christmas and Christmas music worse than Ebenezer Scrooge, you should still catch Trans-Siberian Orchestra, just for the sheer spectacle of their live show. And if you have an appreciation for outstanding musicianship, there's twice as much reason to catch the band's annual holiday tour.

Though the flash is what catches your eye, the true beauty of the TSO show is in the musicianship. I've rarely heard a rock band play more note-perfect renditions of their songs in the live setting, and though the original group is split in two for the two legs of the tour, they've stocked the bands with outstanding musicians.

I caught the western version at the CenturyTel Center in Bossier City with the incredible dual guitar attack of Al Pitrelli and Angus Clark and the string work of Anna Phoebe. Phoebe's performance, was, I believe, the first time I've ever seen such a roar from a rock crowd after a violin solo. And, of course, it goes without saying that there were remarkable vocal moments from Michael Lanning, Guy LeMonnier and Jill Gioia.

The band opened the show with a run-through of the first album, "Christmas Eve and Other Stories." Though a few bits were dropped, probably due to the personnel required to perform them, the show hit all of the high points, including "First Snow," "A Mad Russian's Christmas" and of course, the song that brought the house down, "Christmas Eve Sarajevo 12/24."

The second set was a bit more of a laid-back production. The band members took some time to have a little fun with the crowd. Also impressive here was the great spontaneous crowd interaction, and the lively crowd helped. Trans-Siberian Orchestra ran through songs from "The Lost Christmas Eve," "Beethoven's Last Night" and even jammed out a cover of Led Zeppelin's "Rock and Roll."

High points of the second set were the band's version of Carl Orff's "Carmina," scheduled to appear on their forthcoming non-Christmas album "Night Castle," and an absolutely stunning version of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony, complete with sparklers, fire blasts on the big familiar notes and the same impressive laser show that accompanied most of the evening.

The show closed with a memorable keyboard battle between Jane Pitrelli and Carmine Giglio (and that's saying something considering my usual disdain for keyboard.) The battle culminated in a performance of the theme song from "Peanuts" leading into "Wish Liszt" from "The Lost Christmas Eve" and finally a reprise of "Christmas Eve Sarajevo" with Clark and Phoebe circulating through the crowd, ending up ... well, I can't give away all the surprises, can I?

Almost as interesting as the show was the crowd. There were long-haired guys in Savatage and Megadeth T-shirts rubbing elbows with perfectly groomed senior couples in suits and party dresses - that's something you don't see everyday. It's actually a little funny to see a grandmother bobbing her head to what is, essentially, Savatage with a string section and a huge production budget. But it's kind of cool, too.

This was my first TSO show, and I was so impressed that I'm making plans to see the band again before Christmas and to travel wherever I have to in order to catch the show next year. I've seen a lot of concerts, and a lot of great concerts. Simply put, Trans-Siberian Orchestra is one of the most incredible shows I've ever seen.

Interview: Al Pitrelli of Trans-Siberian Orchestra

When it comes to rock resumés, guitarist Al Pitrelli's is pretty impressive. He's played with shock rock king Alice Cooper, thrash titans Megadeth and power metal masters Savatage. So what's he doing in a tuxedo on a classical Christmas tour playing to crowds that range from young children to senior citizens? Even he's not sure.

It started back in 1995, when he was hired to play on Savatage's "Dead Winter Dead" record, a concept album about the war in Bosnia that featured the song "Christmas Eve (Sarajevo 12/24)," a blend of rock, classical and "The Carol of the Bells."

The song was a surprise hit on rock radio during the holiday season, and it wasn't long before O'Neill, Savatage founder Jon Oliva, Pitrelli and Robert Kinkel were working on a full project in the same vein, mixing rock, classical and traditional Christmas music. The result, "Christmas Eve and Other Stories," was released in 1996. Even then, Pitrelli wasn't convinced.

"I said, `Nobody will buy it but your mother and mine, but we'll have a whole lot of fun recording it,'" he said with a laugh. "Lo and behold, we're here, nine years later, and I can't believe what it's grown into. I'm so proud of it."

What it's grown into is a holiday phenomenon. The band has released two other Christmas albums - "The Christmas Attic" in 1998 and "The Lost Christmas Eve" in 2004 - and a non-Christmas album, "Beethoven's Last Night" in 2000. They also have a live DVD, "The Ghost of Christmas Eve," and are currently working on another non-Christmas album, "Night Castle."

Trans-Siberian Orchestra started touring for the holidays in 1999, and now, due to demand and the time constraints of the holiday season, it's grown into two full tours - one for the eastern half of the United States and a second for the western half.

For the first half of the concert, TSO plays "Christmas Eve and Other Stories" and for the second half, they mix things up with numbers off their other albums and even a few surprises.

"We're all just a bunch of barroom rock `n' rollers from back in the day, so we'll always pull out a cover tune or two and just have some fun," Pitrelli said. "It's a long show, and we'll cover a lot of ground over the course of two and a half hours."

And there's also a stage spectacle for audiences to enjoy, with plenty of lights, fire and smoke pulled from the band's rock roots.

"It will be bigger than last year, but not as big as next year," Pitrelli joked about the stage show. "That's the Paul O'Neill way of doing things."

Pitrelli also sees the tour as a way to break the stereotypes that surround musicians - the stiff-necked classical musician and the primadonna rocker. He admits that it gets challenging at times to get rockers and classical musicians on the same page, but in the end, they find a lot of common ground.

"What we try to do is dispel the clichés," he said. "The six or seven rockers in the TSO band are very well-educated musicians with a wide vocabulary, and the string section that we have, I think they're all closet headbangers."

But what would some of the older members of the audience think if they knew the guy directing this classical Christmas show played with Alice Cooper?

"You'd be surprised how many of those 70-year-old grandmothers are wearing Alice Cooper T-shirts under their sweaters," he joked. "I don't think music has a demographic age-wise anymore. When you look out in the audience, there are 80-year-old women who are just banging their heads, and there are 8- or 9-year-old kids listening closely to the poetry and ballads. You never know, good music is good music."

Still, he admits his resumé does occasionally raise some eyebrows.

"When some of the older folks hear about Megadeth, they say `oh, my,' but we play with them a little bit and have some fun," Pitrelli said. "We're light-hearted about it, and we poke fun at ourselves. By the end of the evening, everybody gets it, and we keep them in on the joke so to speak."

The annual holiday tour keeps growing, and Pitrelli admits that he would like to see Trans-Siberian Orchestra last beyond the musicians involved.

"As a musician, one of the things that you dream about is that your music lives a lot longer than you do," he said. "To be part of someone's Christmas tradition long after I'm gone, yeah, I'd be real proud to know that was happening."

Review: Exodus, "Shovel-Headed Kill Machine"

Ah, now this is more like it. A lot of my old thrash-loving friends went crazy with last year's release of "Tempo of the Damned." I just couldn't get into it the way they did. The sound was there, but I didn't hear the energy of Exodus. I definitely hear it on this album.

Before anyone points it out, I realize that it's hard to really consider this an Exodus record. It's basically Gary Holt and four other guys at this point. But based on what I'm hearing, maybe fresh blood is what was needed. The most obvious change, of course, will be new vocalist Rob Dukes, who replaces Steve "Zetro" Souza. Correction, who blows away Steve "Zetro" Souza. I grew up on Exodus with Souza vocals (I was a latecomer to the band), but Dukes offers a voice that can easily pull off Souza and Paul Baloff vocals, but has a little more rage in it. Of course, no one was concerned about Paul Bostaph taking over the drums. We all know what he's capable of. The third lineup change, Lee Altus, provides a seamless complement to Holt's guitar work. I was a little bummed at the loss of Rick Hunolt, but Altus fills in nicely.

Now, to the music. It kicks you in the head from the first song and never lets up. I popped the CD in, and before I was a minute into the first song, "Raze," I was already grooving. It remains one of my favorites on the album, possibly because I can visualize my office when Dukes rages "Light this motherfucker like a roman candle, burn this bitch straight to the ground." (Note to any overzealous law enforcement types who might be reading: It's called releasing frustration. I have no plans to burn my office. I need the job). Personal feelings aside, this is a beautiful, blazing thrasher to get the album going. It lets you know upfront what's to come.

Clocking in at over eight minutes, "Deathamphetamine" offers up a slab of pure, unadulterated Exodus, a sound from the glory days of the band. The same goes for most of the songs on the album. If "44 Magnum Opus" doesn't get your blood pumping, then you should probably go to your nearest funeral home and make arrangements. Easily one of the strongest songs on the album is "Going, Going, Gone," which adds the hooks of "Fabulous Disaster" into the mix. In fact, the whole album reminds me a great deal of a cross between "Fabulous Disaster" and "Pleasures of the Flesh." It's got a nice mix of the hooks and the faster, more aggressive early sound of the band.

The only place that the band misses on this album is by occasionally focusing on tired subject matter, see pedophile priests in "Altered Boy." But when the music is this solid, who cares what the songs are about?

Go get this album. It's a true thrashterpiece, the likes of which we haven't heard in a while.

Get "Shovel-Headed Kill Machine."

Review: Fear Factory, "Transgression"

With 2004's Archetype Fear Factory surprised fans with a return to the vicious cyber metal of their first two albums, Soul of a New Machine and Demanufacture. A year and a half later, they’re back to the mediocre music of their middle albums.

For a frustrated 20-year-old kid angry at the fact that his favorite bands seemed to be going soft, Fear Factory’s Soul of a New Machine was a swift kick in the pants. It had the intensity of the old-school thrash I craved mixed with clanking industrial noises, just a touch of death metal and these cool melodic passages that seemed to be out of place, yet at the same time perfectly suited for the sound. The follow-up, Demanufacture, was just as good. But then, they started doing techno remixes of their albums. That was the first clue this band was over. The next was the uninspired third album Obsolete. After that Fear Factory quickly fell of my radar. I was vaguely aware that they were still out there and having some internal strife, but every time I heard something by them, I found it fairly boring.

Then came Archetype, and the return of the familiar sound I remembered from those two early albums. It was perhaps a bit more melodic, but I had high hopes for a return to glory. Until now.

Transgression features the trademark mechanical-sounding drum lines and guitar riffing that Fear Factory’s known for, and the heavier parts of songs like “540,000 Degrees Fahrenheit” and the title track are as tight as anything the band has ever done. But here, those trademark sounds are perhaps a bit too mechanical. At times they sound almost as if someone took all of Fear Factory’s previous albums, plugged them into a computer and told it to spit out something that sounded similar. The riffs are solid, but there’s no real passion, anger or any emotion at all. None of the songs are particularly memorable. The alternating melodic and gruff vocals from Burton Bell are still there, but he doesn’t use them as effectively. The entire album seems devoid of the melodic hooks that have marked the band’s best work.

The lightweight turn toward the middle of the album doesn’t help. The lethargic “Echo of My Scream” is enough to put the listener to sleep for a few songs, and the upbeat, Southern California pop-punk sound of “I Will Follow” wakes you with a jolt and an urge to puke. Really, the only song on the album that sticks with me is “Millennium,” which has a nice old-school thrash feel on the verse. Even it’s not really something that I’d listen to for long, though.

I had a lot of hope for this album, but I come away from it disappointed once again. The band and label have been comparing the album to Obsolete, and I’d have to agree with that comparison. I felt the same way about that album. It sounds like Fear Factory, only boring and uninspired. The real Transgression here is against the fans that bought into the comeback.

Get "Transgression."

Review: Alice Cooper, "Dirty Diamonds"

Popping in the latest album from Alice Cooper is a lot like entering a time warp. The first thing I noticed when I picked this record up is that the cover looked a lot like one of his 1970s albums. When I put it in the CD player, it sounded a lot like one of those albums as well.

Alice Cooper has shown a chameleon-like ability to keep his music in line with the current trends, while managing to put just enough Alice Cooper into the music to not sound like a trend-chaser. (Well, there was the awful Hey Stoopid, but I’ll forgive him that – even though it took me about 10 years to do it.) So in the 1980s, he flirted with the hair band sound, gaining his most commercial success with Trash. Then in the late 1990s, he absorbed the nu-metal sound, producing the heaviest, and in my mind one of the best, albums of his career with Brutal Planet. Then, he came full circle with his last album, The Eyes of Alice Cooper. Much of that album echoed his original sound, which also just happens to be the sound of the current garage rock trend. (You know, all those “The” bands.)

Dirty Diamonds takes the concept of "Eyes" one step further and immerses the listener completely in the 1970s sounds, bringing Cooper back to the gritty Detroit rock that brought him to the dance. “Woman of Mass Distraction” and “Sunset Babies (All Got Rabies)” would be right at home on any of his 1970s albums. A strong Stones influence comes through on “Perfect” and there’s a feel-good, bubblegum feel to “You Make Me Wanna.” But this is still an Alice Cooper record, and things turn a bit nastier on the title track, which sounds like a cross between the Misfits’ “Where Eagles Dare” and Black Sabbath’s “Paranoid.”

Cooper’s legendary black humor is still in full effect on this album, on songs like “Own Worst Enemy.” Perhaps the best example, though, is on “The Saga of Jesse Jane,” a twisted take on a Johnny Cash-style storytelling ballad that offers the chuckles for the record. There’s also a surprise here and there, like the funky “Run Down the Devil,” the bluesy number “Six Hours” and even a duet with rapper Xzibit, “Stand.” (Though I do have to say I could have lived quite happily without ever hearing an Alice Cooper duet with any rapper, but that’s just my personal musical tastes.) Through it all, Alice is still at his best when he’s rocking out, as on the driving (no pun intended) “Steal That Car” or the rollicking “Sunset Babies.”

There are also a couple of trademark slower, dark tunes a la “Welcome to My Nightmare.” “Pretty Ballerina” really doesn’t do much for me, but “Zombie Dance” works quite well, evoking a voodoo feel.

In the end, Dirty Diamonds certainly won’t rival Cooper’s great 1970s albums like Billion Dollar Babies and Welcome to My Nightmare, but it proves that he can still rock. This is a fun record for both the long-time Alice Cooper fan and fans of the current garage rock scene.

Get "Dirty Diamonds."

Review: Arch Enemy, "Doomsday Machine"

When Angela Gossow joined Arch Enemy for 2002's "Wages of Sin," she not only kicked down the door for women in the male-dominated extreme metal genres, she stomped it into splinters.

This, the band's third album with Gossow on vocals, completes an evolution begun on "Wages of Sin" from a Gothenburg-style death metal band to a melodic metal machine. The only blast-beats to be found are on the mediocre "Out for Blood," and the melodies on songs like "My Apocalypse," "Carry the Cross" and "Mechanic God Creation" are almost hummable. That's sure to make the heavier-than-thou death metal set foam at the mouth and scream "sellout," but it's also sure to open the band up to a wider audience that may not be comfortable exploring the most extreme fringes of the metal genre.

The band offers a nod to their influences, including British metal band Diamondhead on "Machtkampf" and Queen on the instrumental "Hybrids of Steel." Brothers Christopher and Michael Amott deliver biting guitar riffs, and the album contains some of drummer Daniel Erlandsson's best work to date, as heard on the first single "Nemesis."

Fans of the band's first two albums with vocalist Johan Liiva may not like it, but fans of old-school thrash bands like Metallica and Slayer will want to check this out.

Get "Doomsday Machine."

Review: Demons and Wizards, "Touched by the Crimson King"

Imagine it's the mid-1980s and a new album has just hit the shelves featuring Glenn Tipton and K.K. Downing on guitar and Bruce Dickinson on vocals. So, neither Iced Earth nor Blind Guardian have had the incredible success or influence of Judas Priest or Iron Maiden, but for modern power metal fans the teaming of guitarist Jon Schaffer and vocalist Hansi Kursch is akin to that mythical pairing. It’s the best guitar riffs in the genre meeting the best vocals in the genre.

The two became friends as road dogs. Throughout the 1990s, the two bands toured Europe relentlessly, often together. Finally in the late 1990s, when Schaffer visited Kursch in Germany, the two sat down and jammed together. The result of that jam session was their first song, "My Last Sunrise," and eventually the 1999 self-titled debut from Demons and Wizards. It was a blazing album that rivaled the best work of their regular bands, but because of the schedules of Iced Earth and Blind Guardian, Demons and Wizards didn’t get to tour much beyond some European festivals. That’s also the reason it took six years for the two to get together and record another album – and again it doesn’t appear they’ll get to do more than a few shows in support of it.

"Touched by the Crimson King" opens with a nice operatic approach on the title track, which reminds me a bit of Carl Orff’s "Carmina Burana" or Jerry Goldsmith’s "Ave Satani." The rest of the song isn’t very different from what listeners heard on the band’s first album. It ranges from supercharged power metal runs to chugging traditional metal bits to haunting interludes to the operatic choruses. There are plenty of big, dramatic flourishes throughout the album, but they never cross over into the melodramatic as a lot of power metal bands do.

Schaffer and Kursch break from other power metal bands in other ways, as well. For one thing, there’s a great deal of variety on this album. "Terror Train" is a full-on power metal burner, with impossibly fast riffs from Schaffer, while "Beneath These Waves" is a mid-tempo tune that relies on some infectious melodic bits. The downside of that strategy comes on the melancholy "Down Where I Am." Lyrically, it’s a very dark song that requires a great deal of emotion, and I just never seem to get the full sadness from the vocals that should be there. It’s the only real misstep on the album, though. The other slow songs, "Seize the Day" and "Wicked Witch" both work incredibly well.

No Kursch album would be complete without literary references, and "Touched by the Crimson King" is peppered with them, beginning with the William Blake reference in the title. There’s also a nod to Stephen King’s Dark Tower series ("The Gunslinger"), "The Wizard of Oz" ("Wicked Witch") and Oscar Wilde’s "The Picture of Dorian Gray" ("Dorian"). Of the literary songs, the best is "Dorian," which has an irresistible traditional riff and an epic feel. The most interesting, on the other hand, is probably "Wicked Witch," which offers a sympathetic take on the character that’s one of the ultimate big bads in both literature and film.

If the album has one problem, it’s an issue shared by most power metal albums – the production is a bit thin. It’s not surprising in a genre that’s so focused on vocals and guitar. I can’t help but think how incredibly powerful this album would be if some of those super-fast double-bass lines were actually thumping you in the chest or if the punctuating drums on the title track or "Dorian" really thundered like they should. It’s not that the production is bad, just that it could have been more.

If you’re familiar with Blind Guardian and Iced Earth, the talent level on the album is exactly what you’d expect. Schaffer’s riffs are as fast, tight and precise as they come. I’ll admit that Kursch’s voice will probably be an acquired taste for some due to his thick German accent, but in terms of range and versatility, you won’t find a much better singer in the power metal genre. Both are in fine form here.

Kursch and Schaffer close the album solidly with a cover of Led Zeppelin’s "Immigrant Song." I’ve been waiting for a power metal band to take this song and really kick serious ass with it for a long time. It’s such a perfect song for the genre, from the riff to the lyrical content. Quite a few have tried, but Demons and Wizards are the first to finally nail it. Ultimately, I don’t think "Touched by the Crimson King" is quite as good as the 1999 album, which was a bit more fast-paced and had more of a medieval feel, but it’s still an outstanding offering. I only hope we don’t have to wait six more years for another one.

Get "Touched by the Crimson King."

Review: Kiuas, "The Spirit of Ukko"

It’s rare for an album to catch my ear on first listen. Usually I have to hear it three or four times before I can really form an opinion on it. But sometimes an album hits me like the bolt of lightning crackling from the sky on this album cover. If you’re a power metal fan, go get this album now. It’s that good.

Though Kiuas has been around since 2000 and recorded a number of EPs, this is their first full-length album – well, at eight songs and 42 minutes, it’s more like an extended EP by today’s standards. That’s a problem, since I wanted this album to keep going. At first listen, I thought this was a power metal outfit with a death metal fetish, as the title track breaks out in blast beats and some melodic death riffing. That in itself was interesting to me. Singer Ilja Jalkanen sounded a bit like Zachary Stevens with a heavy accent on the track – another point in the album’s favor in this Savatage fan’s estimation.

But that was just the beginning. Through the course of the album, the music takes sidetrips into medieval sounds, Viking metal, neoclassical and a few other styles. It’s all tied together with an old-fashioned hard rock sensibility, due in large part to Jalkanen’s delivery. That old school feel is particularly evident on “No More Sleep for Me” and “Warrior Soul.” Whereas most power metal bands feel the need to have a singer with a “pretty” voice, Jalkanen puts a little more grit and power into his vocals. He can pull off the traditional high-pitched harmonies, but he can also snarl and scream when the music calls for it. He claims bluesmen Buddy Guy and Howlin’ Wolf among his influences, which seems a bit odd for a guy from Finland, but you can hear a bit of that blues tone in his voice and it puts him miles beyond the same-sounding vocalists that dominate the genre. It proves that you can sound like a man and still be a great power metal vocalist.

There’s a great deal of Manowar influence on the album, particularly on songs like “On Winds of Death We Ride” and “Warrior Soul.” If you’re not into the warrior metal schtick, don’t worry, it’s not quite as over-the-top as some of the acts out there. Besides this album is so musically solid, they could be singing “Jesus Loves Me,” and it would sound cool. In fact, the only weak song on the album is the semi-ballad, “Thorns of a Black Rose,” and even it’s not a bad song. Mikko Salovaara lays down some gorgeous acoustic guitar work on the soft parts that raises it above the melodrama of the rest. I was also impressed with Atte Tanskanen’s key work. It adds a great deal of atmosphere to the songs, but it doesn’t stick out, even when it plays a primary role in the song. That seems obvious, but if you’ve listened to a lot of power metal, you’ll know that not every keyboard player gets it.

Kiuas pulls out a new surprise on almost every track, adding a variety of elements to their music without ever sacrificing their identity. Whether it’s the Malmsteen-like sweep arpeggios of “Warrior Soul” or the chugging Meshuggah-style riffs on “And the North Star Cried,” it’s obvious that Kiuas knows what their strengths are as a band and they use their influences well to accentuate those.

This is how power metal should be done, and if Kiuas doesn’t quickly rise to the top ranks of the genre, something is seriously out of whack.

Get "The Spirit of Ukko."

Review: Chris Caffery, "W.A.R.P.E.D."

I’m not a big fan of mixing politics and music. For one thing, I’ve got a lot of strong opinions, and I’ve had otherwise good songs ruined for me because I couldn’t bring myself to belt out lyrics that I disagreed with. For another, I think when artists start to promote an agenda with their music, the message becomes the driving force and the music suffers. I know it’s a long-standing tradition, and I suppose if you’re doing acoustic folk rock where the lyrics are the primary focus it’s OK. In metal, though, I just believe the music should come first.

That’s why I was a little nervous when I picked up this latest effort from Chris Caffery, an expansion of the God Damn War EP that came along with last year’s Faces. Being the Savatage fanboy that I am, I didn’t want to dislike a Caffery album. I was pleasantly surprised. While there are a few moments of political posturing, for the most part he stays away from the politics and focuses on war itself. The overriding theme here is “war = bad,” which I think everyone, no matter what their political opinions or affiliations can agree with.

The album opens with the mid-paced clunker “Home is Where the Hell Is,” but picks up quickly with the second track, the previously released “God Damn War.” Listening to the song now, I think the same thing I did when I first heard it – this would be one hell of a song with Jon Oliva on vocals. It’s still a pretty good song with Caffery doing his best Oliva impression. It’s got one of the strongest guitar riffs on the album and really has the feel of a Gutter Ballet-era ’Tage tune – say, fittingly, “Of Rage and War.”

The first surprise of the album comes on “Election Day,” an old school Megadeth thrasher, complete with Caffery doing a pretty passable Dave Mustaine impression. He returns to the Megadeth sound on “Saddamize,” which has some really nice middle-eastern guitar-work and reminds me of some of the stuff on Rust in Peace, despite a white noise intro that goes on far too long. Another mid-tempo number, “Erase” has a memorable chorus melody, but once again I find myself missing Oliva’s vocals, which would have put the song over the top. It’s got a real Doctor Butcher vibe to it. The same can be said of the frantic “Edge of Darkness.”

Quite a few of the songs on this album suffer from simply not being very memorable. Caffery turns in nice riffs on most of the songs, but nothing about the rest of the song stands out. Great examples of this are the forgettable “Fool! Fool!,” “State of the Head” and “I.” I won’t even mention the version of “Amazing Grace,” punctuated with bomb explosions and gunfire, which, while I understand the reasoning, seems incredibly out of place here.

I finally get the blast of Oliva that I’ve been longing for on “Iraq Attack,” a song originally written for Doctor Butcher during the first Gulf War. It’s appropriate that they pull it out in a similar situation. It’s a darker piece, complete with Sirens-style shrieks, that would have been right at home on the Doctor Butcher album. The lyrics, at times, seem a little forced, but it’s still one of the strongest songs here. Caffery follows that up with the addictively catchy title track, which has a bouncy hook that won’t get out of your head. “Beat Me, You’ll Never Beat Me” has a satisfyingly heavy verse and chorus, with an acoustic bridge that finds Caffery doing his best Geddy Lee impression.

Ultimately, I don’t think W.A.R.P.E.D. is nearly as strong as Faces. But out of the 15 songs on the album, 10 of them are pretty solid. That’s not a bad average. Then again, I could also be jaded a bit by my frustration at not having had a new Savatage record in four years while Caffery and Oliva keep pumping out solo projects. Here’s hoping that once they get the new TSO album finished, they’ll finally get around to getting back in the studio with Savatage.

Get "W.A.R.P.E.D."