THE BLACK MAGES

Final Fantasy fight songs (all the songs on this album is a fighing themes in one way or another) reworked into a metal-style by a japanese rock band with Nobuo Uematsu himself om keyboards is almost too good a concept to be true.

It is, however, and it is also very well executed on this first, self-titled album by The Black Mages.

Now, first of all, you must understand i am a HUGE final fantasy fan, and i know all of these songs by heart, having them firmly placed into my brain by hours and hours of playing the games and then listening to them in midi-format on my computer, mp3 on my mp3player, and then humming them all day long in school. That is why many of these songs have very much of a sentimental value for me. Therefore, i will just say to the already familiar with Final Fantasy music that there is no reason to worry, the songs are very well performed by rather good instrumentalists (and of course, the master himself behind the keys). If you don't like metal, you might have a slight problem with it at first, but i think that the songs are so familiar to you that you will eventually see past that and just let yourself go completely and go back to that time when you sat hours and hours levelling your characters to the highest lever fo no other purpose than to have done it. Highly recommended.

For the uninitiated, however, it is not so easy. It is basically instrumental power metal, with a lot of synth and guitar solos. I can't rally judge this objectively from a metal-perspective though, as i am rather unfamiliar with the genre, but i would say that it is not all that bad even from a metal-head point of view. The melodies are very catchy, and "Dancing mad" (the rason why they're really on the archives, i'm guessing) is probably the best, objectively. the beginning is a good build with church organ and it goes through some pretty interesting changes throughout.

My favourite tracks are "Clash on the big bridge", also known as gilgamesh's theme from FF5, and "Fight with seymour" but if you're not into the games at all, of tv-game music, i suggest that you listen to "Dancing mad" right here and then leave the rest where it is.

i rate it Good, but non-essential, only because it is very much directed to us tv-game freaks, but if that is who you are, and also happen to like the harder side of rock, then it is very highly recommended.