HARMAGEDON

I have struggled to find the words with which to properly review this album. I could tell you all about the all star crew that makes up the band: Daniel Fries, along with drummer Collin Leijenaar (Neal Morse/Dilemma), bass player Mike Lepond (Symphony X), and vocalist Ted Leonard (Spock's Beard/Enchant/Thought Chamber). Plus they have four special guests on keyboards: Jordan Rudess, Derek Sherinian, Neal Morse, and Alex Argento. I could also talk about their masterful blending of their metal instrumentation with the symphonic arrangements pulled off by the Polish orchestra Sinfonietta Consonus. Or I could tell you about the concept of this album, dealing with the end times in a very unique way (for this musical genre) and inspired by the fears of the world ending in 2012 based on the Mayan calendar. But I wanted to make this personal, and so I decided to write the following as a letter to the band - perhaps by some chance one of them will read it:

Thank you. Thank you for having the courage, the integrity, the diligence, and the drive to create an album like this, and doing so with such power. You don't know how long I've waited for someone to create an album with this level of technical musicality, in this style of music, with this level of quality, and with this kind of lyrical concept, treated with such a high level of integrity and respect. You may never know how much you've inspired me, or how uplifting this was to me. The lyrical concepts of this album were presented in such a beautiful way, with dark passages that made the highs of the album all the more beautiful, that as I listened to this, I was filled with indescribable joy, driving me to the point of tears, and I pondered things which I really ought to ponder more often. From a brother in Metal, and, I believe, in many other ways: rock on!