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Black Axe wrote:Doctor Butcher and JOP are both quite uneven. And the JOP records suffer from bad, slightly modernish, (guitar) sounds. I'm not really familiar with CIIC.

The guys should work together in Savatage, that's were their songwriting compliments each other and works best.

I agree the Doctor Butcher record is quite uneven, but some tracks are just great. The opener is amazing vintage Savatage.

The JOP discography might look uneven overall, but to me the Maniacal Renderings album is an amazing masterpiece that shows true Savatage grace throughout. A strong 9/10, one of the five best albums of the past decade and the best "Savatage" album since 1993. The other three albums are more uneven but all with some great stuff, to me they¨re all 7/10. I don't hear how JOP sounds any more modern than late Savatage.

As for Circle II Circle, you need to check out the first album Watching in Silence. All the music on it was written by Jon Oliva and Chris Caffery with lyrics by Zak Stevens. Musically, to me this album is the missing link between Edge of Thorns and Handful of Rain. After that they released an incredibly dull record before they got their act together and have released two capable albums. The last one, Delusions of Grandeur, features their fastest and most aggressive material and is not bad at all. They write their own songs nowadays.

Handful of Rain is their weakest release IMO!

Even weaker than Fight For the Rock & Power Of The Night...

Very hard to beat HOTMK! Their first for me... and BEST by a mile!

I also very much like/love Streets & Gutter Ballet... and most of the rest!

I don't understand the slagging and general low ratings when it comes to "Power Of The Night". It's obviously not the bands best album but it's still very competent and much the same as the bands first few.

Avenger wrote:I don't understand the slagging and general low ratings when it comes to "Power Of The Night". It's obviously not the bands best album but it's still very competent and much the same as the bands first few.

I like most of the songs fountain of youth is one of my favorite Savatage songs actually.

Power of the Night is not a weak album per see, but at the time Savatage were obviously in need of new ideas to get to the next level. If for good or for bad is for everybody to decide for themselves - but in Savatage's streak of 11 full length albums in 18 years, Power of the Night is pretty much the only one that doesn't show any progression from the previous one.

mordred wrote:Power of the Night is not a weak album per see, but at the time Savatage were obviously in need of new ideas to get to the next level. If for good or for bad is for everybody to decide for themselves - but in Savatage's streak of 11 full length albums in 18 years, Power of the Night is pretty much the only one that doesn't show any progression from the previous one.

I'll agree with that, however, what's wrong with sticking to a good thing? They had the formula right, why change it?

Is there a reason to think that a band must "progress" and change they're sound on every new album?

Progression itself is neither good nor bad by definition, like I said it's up to everybody to decide for themselves if a progression was for better or for worse according to their taste.

Savatage in my opinion progressed very good over the years with the exception of Fight for the Rock which was not a progression in my taste. I'm not saying every Savatage album was better than the previous of course, but from 1987 onwards every new album was very interesting and also very good in my opinion.

As for Power of the Night and "sticking to a good formula" - it's very hard to top an album without adding something new to the next one. Most bands that don't change anything peak with their first or second album and get more or less watered down after that. Power of the Night was OK in its own right, but it was not an improvement from Sirens and Dungeons. Sirens and Dungeons were written during the same timespan and even recorded at the same time, so I think they must be considered the same entity.