A little bit of Gamma Ray, a few
Iron Maiden riffs, some choir parts and a tad of Thrash. That seems to be the recipe for success for a lot of Power Metal bands, and nothing is necessarily wrong with that. It's just that we've heard it all before, so it needs to be good.
Really good!
When the Power Metal wave first swept the nations, I found that a lot of bands used these ingredients (and a lot more), blending them together in a new way, or otherwise gave the music a bit of own identity. Some bands still do that, but it's getting further and further in between them.
Dungeon from Australia is one of those many faceless bands, and
One Step Beyond is one of these records where no song, verse, or chorus sticks to me as mindblowing, but nothing stands out as really bad either.
A fine sense for melodies are evident in tracks like the cool opener
The Power Within, as well as the almost epic
Under The Cross, which both impress with their sing along ability and enjoyable melodies. On the contrary, there's not enough good stuff in the terribly long
Tarranno Del Mar, which ends up in an uninspired, boring routine.
Dungeon has a more Thrashy approach to Power Metal than usual; the music is underlined with hard, galloping riffs and pounding drums, which is evident in the very cool titletrack, one of the best songs on the album.
Unfortunately the drum work on One Step Beyond strikes me as very boring, and one of the weakest points on the album, they are extremely generic and without any sense for detail. Especially the harder songs, like the thrasher
The Art Of War suffers from this. In contrast to this, there are plenty of melodic guitar parts, and a raw, cool singer to enhance the listening experience. The singer is actually pretty skilled. Unfortunately, he shows too little of what I think he could be capable of, namely singing in both high pitch and with a raw, more personal voice.
Though there are cool melodies, raw Thrash riffs and a good singer to be found on the album, it seems to lack a little bit more personal expressions. It's all just that little bit too predictable.
Lots of small pieces like a riff, a certain bridge or a chorus are really great, but the songs usually get to a point, where they seem longer than they actually are, as for instance is the case with the stretched out ballad
The Hunger.
On tracks like the titletrack, the superb
Under The Cross and the dynamic
Surface Tension,
Dungeon shows that they can create hard, catchy tunes, with lots of cool riffs and melodies, but it just never gets to the point where it
really bites.
Written by
Nina Monday, April 11, 2005
Show all reviews by NinaRatingsNina: 5.5/10Members: No members have rated this album yet.
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