Kamelot - Ghost Opera (2007)

Is there a reason you did this to me, Kamelot? I couldn't find the artwork for their upcoming album because it's still not released, but I put up a picture of their new new DVD. Anyway, Kamelot is an American progressive / power metal band that has, up until now, rocked incredibly hard. Now, I can deal with lack of creativity to a certain extent, but what the fuck?

Their last album, The Black Halo, which was released in 2005, was freaking spectacular. Like, it was awesome. This... what the hell is this? I understand what they were trying to do, but they screwed it up like nobody's business. Everybody liked The Black Halo because, frankly, it was brilliant. So, they wanted to make an album like it, which is understandable. This album follows the sound of The Black Halo, but there is a major, glaring difference; this album is lame.

Think of Ghost Opera as The Black Halo's retarded cousin. Ghost Opera sorta looks like The Black Halo and sorta acts like him, too. But Ghost Opera also talks to grasshoppers and licks cement. There is no driving power behind this effort. It's still polished and pretty sounding, but it's basically just a series of poorly executed ballads.

Now that I'm done being a bastard, I'm going to explain just why I don't like this album. I'm going to be honest, the actual song Ghost Opera is fucking great. I heard it a few weeks ago and loved it and was eager to hear the rest of the album. Then the rest of the album leaked and I wanted to stick my finger in a electrical socket. Think of the song Abandoned off of The Black Halo, but dumbed down about 60 times. That's basically what the rest of the album is. Don't get me wrong, Abandoned is an awesome song. I'm not averse to ballads. When they're done right, they're great. These are just lame. We get it, Kahn, you can sing pretty well. I want more progressive wank. The songs Memento Mori and The March of Mephisto off of The Black Halo were like ear porn, this stuff is just...blah.

It's a very slow album. I can dig slow stuff, but it's drudgingly slow in the sense that it becomes tedious to listen to. It's also become dreadfully poppy. They were teetering on the edge of this poppy sound with The Black Halo, and they leaped off of it with this album.

I guess I'm just severely disappointed. Their previous work, namely The Fourth Legacy and The Black Halo was great. This is just an all around weak release. It's not progressive anymore, and it's barely even power metal. I'd go as far as calling this album straight up pop rock. For shame, Kamelot, for shame.

2/10