V - THE NEW MYTHOLOGY SUITE

I am often surprised to see that many people rate this album as highly as, if not higher than, the brilliant The Divine Wings Of Tragedy. I find the present album a bit less memorable, a bit less original and less diverse compared to that earlier album. There is no doubt that this is another very good Symphony X album, but it does not blow me away like The Divine Wings Of Tragedy did. I used to rate this album with three stars only, but after further listens over a longer period of time I have decided to raise my rating to four stars.

Every track here is enjoyable for sure, but apart from the short Classical interludes, the songs have basically the same sound throughout. And with a running time of over an hour it is a lot to digest. The Divine Wings Of Tragedy too runs for over an hour but I never got that feeling while listening to that album at least partly because that album is more varied but also because I simply find the material on that album stronger.

Though it is beyond doubt that Symphony X is heavily inspired by Yngwie Malmsteen, while listening to this album I sometimes get the feeling that I'm listening to Yngwie Malmsteen's Rising Force. Not only is the guitar playing of Michael Romeo similar to that of Malmsteen, but some of the keyboard solos of Michael Pinnella are similar to those of Jens Johansson of Malmsteen's band. This is not a major problem though, as Symphony X obviously takes it a bit further.

My biggest problem with this album is that there are no real ballads or even semi-ballads on V and neither is there anything to correspond to the 20 minute plus title track on The Divine Wings Of Tragedy. The closing title track runs for 12 minutes, but despite its tasteful use of piano it is not as diverse and memorable as The Divine Wings Of Tragedy title track.

Overall, I find this album less interesting compared to The Divine Wings Of Tragedy, but still a very good one. Highly recommended!

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