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Iced Earth: Something wicked this way comes

04/06/10 || Smalley

After a worthless debut, and a pretty solid sophomore effort that was held back by an inadequate vocalist, Iced Earth fucken owned the metal world with the incredible one-two punch of “Burnt offerings” & “The dark saga”. Part of that was due to the addition of the mighty Matt Barlow on vocals, and the rest came from the dark, intense atmospheres of both records; “The dark saga” drew on the tortured tale of Spawn for inspiration, and while “offerings” didn’t necessarily have a unifying storyline, most of its tracks did draw on an overarching theme of hell/damnation, giving its songs much more gravitas than they would’ve had otherwise, and resulting in one of better metal albums of the 90’s.

But, there’s no way any band can stay on top forever, so there had to be an eventual come-down in quality, right? Well, “Something wicked this way comes” was just such a come-down, but fortunately, was no where near a disaster. While it doesn’t have the ominous intensity of the previous two albums, and thus, lacks their sheer personality and impact, it’s still spirited, well-made, serious-business power metal, which should be refreshing for anyone sick of all the Kamelots clogging up the genre.

Unfortunately, “Burning times” makes for a bit of a lackluster opener, with its relatively unengaging, straight-forward songwriting. Yes, the guitars sound great, as does Barlow’s passionate vocals, but still, song’s kind of a dud. However, “Melancholy (holy martyr)” manages to correct the album’s course with a dramatically soft, acoustic guitar-spiced intro, before picking up into a powerful, vintage-Iced Earth chorus.

It isn’t the best song this band ever did, but still, quite good, and “Disciples of the lie” keeps the album going strong, with a main riff heavy enough to make Slayer turn green (the OLD Slayer…), and an incredibly high energy level sustained all throughout, even during the keyboard interlude at the mid-point. From there, power ballads like “Watching over me” and “Blessed are you” give us the obligatory uplifting material, a bit generic, but still worthwhile, while the heavier, more energetic shit like “Stand alone” and “My own savior” provide us with some quality headbangage.

It’s a balancing act that Iced Earth pulls off pretty well here, and while, overall, “wicked”‘s track flow isn’t as tight as it could’ve been, and it does go on for too long (dropping a couple of the lesser songs wouldn’t have hurt at all), most of ‘em are still good individually, which in the end, results in a good album , naturally. And again, while “wicked”‘s overall style is no where near as interesting as the previous two Iced Earths, it still has plenty of high-energy drumming/solos, strong vocals from Barlow, and crunchy gallop riffs and ambitious songwriting by Schaffer, so it’s still very check-outable. Just ignore that pretentious bullshit about an ancient Setian conspiracy in the last three tracks, and have fun with this.

Information
Released: 1998
Label: Century Media
Website: Iced Earth MySpace
Band
Matt Barlow: vocals
Jon Schaffer: lead/rhythm guitar
James MacDonough: bass
Larry Tarnowski: lead guitar
Mark Prator: drums
Jim Morris: keyboards

Tracklist
01. Burning Times
02. Melancholy (Holy Martyr)
03. Disciples Of The Lie
04. Watching Over Me
05. Stand Alone
06. Consequences
07. My Own Savior
08. Reaping Stone
09. 1776
10. Blessed Are You
11. Prophecy
12. Birth Of The Wicked
13. The Coming Curse

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