Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Artist: Almanac
Label: Nuclear Blast
Release: 2017
Running time: 51:00
Rating: 4/5
Just over a year after its predecessor »Tsar« came out, Kingslayer is already the second studio album from the symphonic power metal outfit Almanac, led by the remarkable Belarusian composer, producer, arranger and, on top of being a musician, multi-instrumentalist Victor Smolski. The guitar ace and grandmaster is known for his 16 years with the legendary Hamburg metallers Rage, and Almanac is basically a continuation of what Smolski actually carried over from Rage into his new, current project. In 2013 came the album »LMO«, yet another collaboration between Rage and Lingua Mortis Orchestra, which was Victor’s swan song with Rage and a kind of herald of Almanac’s birth.
On the new album, Smolski keeps experimenting with two male vocalists and one female vocalist: David Readman, Andy B. Franck and Janette Marchewka. Three fully formed vocal characters, each breathing in their own essence and bringing a real harvest of variety. Smolski stays sworn to neoclassicism, baroque and classic metal. To combining orchestration with metal. That’s where he’s at home.
»Kingslayer« is a title that fits the style and sound Almanac cultivate remarkably well. Obscurity, drama with a tragic ending, the occult, questions of life and death, and yet. When we talk about combining metal and opera, there’s the obligatory element of bombast and pomp that has to go along with the grandiosity of this kind of songwriting. Guitar phrasing and orchestra merged into one, the whole thing given real movement by rich choral vocal harmonies, with the songs commanded, as already mentioned, by three highly distinctive, authoritative and expressive vocalists. The choruses are packed with melody, singability and musical catchiness, and Smolski (proven many times over), as a skilled composer, is extremely good at and well versed in building up the mood of a song step by step. The peaks of atmosphere are, after all, the choruses.
Alongside the big ambitions, Smolski has once again delivered a bagful of outstanding, first-class soloing to the new album, which sets him far apart from his contemporaries and once again takes the listener’s breath away. Back on the Rage albums, Smolski was already making it clear that he was the main engine of the big stylistic and sonic transformation that his guitar playing brought to the band. His style is instantly recognizable. So is the sound. Compared with its predecessor »Tsar«, the new album feels a little more stripped back. You can tell the orchestral arrangements have been trimmed a bit, so they don’t »push« to the front as much as they did on the debut. This time Smolski took care of the keyboards himself, which means six members took part in the new album (Smolski included) rather than seven, as on the debut. Smolski has also freshened up the rhythm section, while all three vocalists remain, the same lineup as on the studio debut.
The opener Regicide, which after its opening guitar motif strikingly recalls one of the Rage songs written back when Smolski was writing for Rage, already signals that »Kingslayer« will be even harder-hitting than its predecessor. Then again, associations like that are palpable at every turn, since Rage have always loved orchestral arrangements, and that essence is consequently engraved into Almanac’s music as well. So. Anyone who loves Rage with Smolski will take to Almanac instantly. Even though there’s a huge gulf in style and sound between the two bands, Smolski remains the element in both that brings something special and specific, even if in power metal everything has already been invented and said. His guitar style and sound are strictly distinctive and recognizable. So there’s no way we can talk about anything generic here.
»Kingslayer« thus deepens Almanac’s expressive essence and cements the band’s position on the world metal map. Experience, talent, inspiration! Victor Smolski and his crew of outstanding singers are back on the scene with a gorgeous new studio release. Given how quickly it came together, it’s remarkably high quality and very ambitious in its songwriting, and he attacked it with extraordinary dedication once again.
Almanac – Losing My Mind (official video):
Lineup
Andy B. Franck – vocals
David Readman – vocals
Jeannette Marchewka – vocals
Victor Smolski – guitar, keyboards
Tim Rashid – bass guitar
Athanasios ‘Zacky’ Tsoukas – drums
Production
Victor Smolski
Track list
01. Regicide
02. Children Of The Sacred Path
03. Guilty As Charged
04. Hail To The King
05. Losing My Mind
06. Kingslayer
07. Kingdom Of The Blind
08. Headstrong
09. Last Farewell
10. Red Flag
