Author: Peter Podbrežnik
Artist: Jag Panzer
Label: SPV Records
Release: 2017
Running time: 44:45
Rating: 4.5/5
»The Deviant Chord« is the long-awaited comeback of the cult American power metallers Jag Panzer, who seemed to have said their final goodbye back in 2011, after the album »The Scourge of the Light«. That record was actually their most commercially successful to date, at least by the standards of today’s metal scene, but the cost of touring forced them into retirement yet again. It looked like the end, but in 2013 the wheel of fortune turned the right way. After a long absence, the highly respected guitar virtuoso Joey Taffola returned to the Jag Panzer ranks. The last time he’d ripped up the strings with them was on »The Fourth Judgment« (1997), and his return gave the rest of the guys a new burst of energy and convinced them to rise from the dead and head back into the studio after all this time. The result of creating together again with Taffola in the lineup is »The Deviant Chord«, the best Jag Panzer album since the conceptual masterpiece »Thane To The Throne« (2000). That one still remains the peak of their discography, but with »The Deviant Chord« it finally has a worthy successor. The Jag Panzer albums in between, from 2001 to 2011, were all very solid if not outright very good, but none of them managed to get back to the creative level of the late nineties/early 2000s.
»The Deviant Chord« is a surprisingly successful blend of the raw Jag Panzer sound the classic lineup laid down on the cult debut »Ample Destruction« (1984), the progressive, sometimes string-laced arrangements they started swearing by after returning to power metal in the mid-nineties, and modern production. Harry ‘The Tyrant’ Conklin is still one of the finest singers on the American metal scene. His voice is hard to pin down. If you can picture Blaze Bayley (ex-Iron Maiden) with a far more technically polished, more elastic range and a less dark vocal approach, you’ll get at least a rough idea. The rest of the band are lucky that Conklin decided to stay in 2014, after they’d already announced they were looking for a new singer.
The guitar partnership between Taffola and Mark Briody works like a well-oiled machine the whole way through, especially when they’re crafting those trademark epic harmonies. Even though Taffola is a guitarist in the same virtuoso league as, say, Paul Gilbert and Tony MacAlpine, both of whom he’s worked with as a solo musician, he doesn’t overdo the solo ego trips, so nothing ever damages the epic structure of the individual songs. What sets Jag Panzer apart from most comparable power metal bands is the brilliantly placed string arrangements, which earned ‘citizenship rights’ in their music on select tracks back in the late nineties. There are a bit more of them on »The Deviant Chord« than before, and just enough to give individual songs a touch of symphonic, progressive flavor and an epic depth.
The opener, »Born of the Flame«, with its epic layered vocals, authoritative drum transitions and melancholic guitar harmonies, is enough to convince you the new Jag Panzer are in excellent form. »Far Beyond All Fear« can already be called a genuine classic, a tasty cross between the classic heavy metal the band made in the eighties and epic power metal with a mighty chorus. The title track, where the melancholic string arrangements kick in for the first time on the album, is a proper Victorian drama with razor-tense atmosphere. A calm intro gives way to a hard-hitting build-up, backed by plenty of mystical layered vocals, and it also features a neoclassical Taffola solo and one of ‘The Tyrant’s’ best vocal performances on »The Deviant Chord«. The more aggressive »Blacklist« also sounds like it got its songwriting blueprint back in the eighties, while the epic harmonies are once again a real balm for every fan of manly, fighting power metal.
»Foggy Dew« is a cover of an Irish folk anthem, which Jag Panzer turned into a great epic with plenty of marching rhythms. Conklin once again shows off his outstanding vocal range, while the melodious, Celtic-tinged guitar harmonies are on a level Iron Maiden wouldn’t be ashamed of either. »Divine Intervention« has the fantasy-medieval atmosphere that last thrilled us on the ‘Arthurian’ venture »The Age of Mastery« (1998) and the ‘Macbethian’ masterpiece »Thane to the Throne«, in other words the albums where this track would easily fit stylistically. »Long Awaited Kiss« opens like a power ballad but soon picks up more epic shades, while the string arrangements are on the level of the unforgettable classic »The Moors« from »The Age of Mastery«.
After the somewhat ‘sleepy’ previous track comes the fully cranked-up »Salacious Behaviour«, where the band ‘fires on all cylinders’ and provides a very fitting contrast, though there’s still no shortage of melancholic harmonies and mighty layered vocals. The excellent overall impression of the album is rounded off by the adrenaline-pumping »Fire of Our Spirit«, where the epic vocal and guitar harmonies are in full bloom while the rhythm section toils at full steam alongside venomous guitar passages, and by the closing ‘barbarian’ anthem »Dare«. The latter sounds like yet another forgotten gem from »The Age of Mastery« or »Thane to the Throne«, which means it’s one of the highlights of »The Deviant Chord« – epic power metal in the truest sense of the word, conjuring up images of long-forgotten, mystical times when real men still wielded swords to defend fair maidens and demonic beasts of every imaginable shape crawled across the world.
Jag Panzer have made a hugely successful return to the power metal scene. If you swear by epic, manly and smart power metal, you’ll be more than thrilled with »The Deviant Chord«. It’s a thoroughly classic album with just the right amount of modern songwriting and production touches, which means it’s exactly what longtime fans want. Taffola was without a doubt the key factor that lifted the rest of the band out of their ‘retirement’ gloom and squeezed the best out of them, both in songwriting and in arranging. The vivid, inventive cover art deserves a thumbs up too. It looks like it was lifted straight out of a Spider-Man comic, and it shows a Victorian version of the unfortunate Dr. Curt Connors in the middle of his transformation into the sinister Lizard.
Lineup
Harry ‘The Tyrant’ Conklin – vocals
Mark Briody – rhythm guitar, keyboards
Joey Taffola – lead guitar
John Tetley – bass guitar, backing vocals
Rikard Stjernquist – drums
Production
John Herrera
Track list
1. Born of the Flame
2. Fary Beyond All Fear
3. The Deviant Chord
4. Blacklist
5. Foggy Dew
6. Divine Intervention
7. Long Awaited Kiss
8. Salacious Behaviour
9. Fire of Our Spirit
10. Dare
