PAIN OF SALVATION

Road Salt One sounds like Pain of Salvation had the idea of doing a stripped-down, non-metal song, did a couple demos, and just went with the best version. Then, they repeated this process until they had enough music to fill an album.

Welcome to Road Salt One, a concept album where half of the songs are explicitly about sex and the other half are about a girl. I found nothing unifying about the album to warrant it a concept album unless it was how every song sounded like part of the same underdeveloped demo, which is not exactly something to strive for. Overall, some credit must be given because this album is indeed unique, but it fails to deliver at all musically.

Rating: 3/10

This album was very much a surprise for me. My enthusiasm for Pain of Salvation had been steadily declining ever since hearing the (in my opinion) excellent Be; I liked Scarsick even if it didn't have the same flow as The Perfect Element or Remedy lane, but Road Salt one seemed so tepid and uninteresting to me that I kind of just checked out on Pain of Salvation. I didn't like the new direction any more than I had Opeth's, and I mentally marked the band down as another casualty of the burnout that seems so prevalent among progressive rockers. As a result, I didn't get this album until it was old news. In fact, if not for a random, impulsive Spotify listen, I probably wouldn't have gotten it at all.

Fortunately for me, though, I did. This is, in my opinion, the best Pain of Salvation album since Remedy Lane (and this is even coming from someone who liked Scarsick a whole lot). While it doesn't return to the pure progressive metal of their earlier work and instead stays firmly within the kind of throwback-rock that the band debuted on Road Salt One, the second installment of the series has something that the first did not: better songs. No, there isn't anything that's been drastically changed since part one, but the songwriting is simply much stronger here. Where the rockers on part one just didn't rock that hard, here we have killer tracks like "The Deeper Cut" and "Mortar Grind" that are raw and heavy and let Daniel Gildenlöw make full use of his considerable vocal talents. As a result, all of the music sounds much more passionate and full, and the songs come off as great songs in their own right instead of just interesting homages.

The softer tracks have improved considerably, as well. Where the ballads in part one seemed to me to be overly melodramatic and even twee (I'm looking at you, "Road Salt") the music here sounds much more genuinely emotional, with tracks like "1979" featuring some of the most passionate singing Mr. Gildenlöw has ever recorded and some truly beautiful and delicate piano. There's a level of subtlety and sophistication in the songwriting here that seemed absent on part one, and as a result this album doesn't suffer from the lulls that killed its predecessor for me.

The other great strength of the album is the variance in the music. There's certainly a throwback flavor to most of the music here, but there's also a touch of the modern to balance out its vintage sensibilities. You'd never mistake something as darkly gritty as "Mortar Grind" for a genuine release of the period, and the music in general feels much more genuinely original on this album than on part one. The prog factor has been upped as well, with the "Road Salt Theme" and "End Credits" giving the album a cinematic, conceptual sense of circularity. There's even a bona-fide long track, "The Physics of Gridlock," which I think can safely fit in with some of the best material PoS has ever written.

Overall, then, Road Salt Two is a powerful statement that good songwriters will be successful no matter what style they choose to write in. The disappointment I felt at Pain of Salvation's "new style" after Road Salt One has been replaced with the realization that one misstep does not mean a band is suddenly "in decline" or "burned out." To anyone who has stopped following Pain of Salvation or let them fall by the wayside of your musical taste, I would highly recommend you check this album out. It's a very solid piece of work.

4/5

The popularity of this band and this album in particular has long mystified me. Maybe it's because I am generally not a fan of Daniel Gildenlow's melodramatic style of both writing and singing, but I am often less wanting to reach my hands through the stereo and choke him so he will shut up. He is just one of those guys who personalities comes shining through in his music way too much. That is not to say that this album is without its moments, which is why I am giving it 2 stars instead of 1. Undertow is a solid song, and Beyond the Pale had good ideas (even if he bludgeoned them with his overbearing personality yet again), but on the flip side, songs like This Heart of Mine are just absolutely putrid. If you are a fan of this band, I can see this being an album you should have, but I would not recommend this CD to anyone I like.

It was the winter of 2006 when I first heard the Perfect Element. I did not like it and did not understand it at first. I was looking for loud music, with distortion, thunderous drums, melody and power chordes.The Perfect element wasn't any of these things. It was, and still is, a masterpiece of musical complexity, with multiple philosophical layers and a clear, perhaps even crude, view of the world. My 15 years old ears were not sufficiently sensitive to these things, and I gave the album up. Fortunately, I gave it another chance two years later, after I have learned a thing or two, and I knew pretty much what I wanted from myself, from the world and my music, three things connected so deeply with one another, it's always strange to me that people seperate them apart. on a second and more sober listening I found all those things I missed before. Ever since then POS became my favorite band. A little later I came across Remedy Lane. Quite a few people praised it as POS' best album, but I was skeptical. I heard it several times and I liked it, but it just couldn't reach the level of The Perfect Element, it just wasn't it. Here, too, I had to go through a kind of twist of perspective to understand the true ingenuity that lies within it. I had to develop as a person, to understand another piece of the world so that I could truly appreciate it. And this change, as you might expect from a teenager, occurred not too long afterwards. By the time I thought I knew everything about the world, I went to hear this album again as my mental state was not particularly stable and I found it comforting. the musical dimness, the lyrics, dealing with love and pain, spoke to me. So I found myself immersed in it, in its meaning, in the emotions it evokes in me. Slowly, through a gradual process, it became the epitome of my love for music. I just can not hear music the same way since. This album completely changed my attitude to music, the world, and myself (because, as noted, these three things are interwoven with one another). The truth is that at some point I abandoned it. It was so deeply ingrained in my head, that I didn't need to hear it anymore. I could also give credit to the emotional ascent I experienced in the last couple of years. This week, however, I had a slight regression, and I found myself going back to places I haven't been to in quite a while. I stared at my iPod, which has, on a permanent basis, the two albums I mentioned by POS, and I wondered if one of them could improve my mood. I decided to hear Remedy Lane again, and suddenly I found myself connecting to it in a new and different level, more mature, as if it revealed a new face that I did not know, which is unlikely because I've heard it dozens of times before. But still it was like this album changed its face completely. When I thought about it I realized that the reason for this feeling wasn't that the album had changed, because it , obviously, remained the same album, but rather because I had changed. How could an album conform to the soul of the listener in such a powerful way? The concept of the album is so far from me - it takes place in Budapest, and it has some sort dimness to it, the kind which belongs only to people who knew true hardship during their lifetime, which luckly I had not, and yet I feel so close to it that sometimes I think that it describes in words and notes my life. how does he do it, Daniel Gildnlow? How can a person that has absolutly no connection to the concept of the album feel like he's part of it? Daniel makes you feel as if you're participating in the album in the kind of way that filmmakers, writers and other musicians could only dream about. Daniel is a master emotional manipulations. this album has so much ingenuity in it and only a little of it is expressed musically. First of all and before all this album is about sexuality. Daniel puts the cards on the table right on the album's opening lines, and makes it clear to us. Unlike anything in modern Western society, and especially the entertainment culture - music, literature, television, cinema, which is based on thin sexual tension, delicate and subtle (sometimes more and sometimes less), Daniel addresses the elephant in the room right from the very beginning. The ingenuity in that is that it frees him to engage in other issues and gives him the opportunity to explore the true meaning of sexuality in our life. What this tells us is that as far as this album is concerned, again, contrary to what we have been taught to think by modern culture, sex is not the summit of human endeavor, it's only a means, it's only a stage in our development as human beings, it's only a glimmer of humanity in a sea of ​​thoughts and emotions we tend to ignore, but they are the human essence in the act itself. The album is a search for meaning made by a person who has lost his beloved, and as a result has lost himself. He starts with a desperate return to Budapest in attempt to meet with his lover from the past, and have a sexual experience which was supposed to solve all his problems. Slowly we learn the source of the doubts, and why the two parted, and what answers were received after that voyage, but not before we move along with the protagonist, through the journey along Memory Lane (an expression which is the inspiration for the album's name). What POS does better than any other band is to paint the human soul with musical notes. While other music is really just a collection of notes which are there because they sound good, or because they are suitable for mathematical or any other reason, POS's music is built of emotions. Each note comes exactly where it should to express a feeling, a thought, an idea . every strum has a meaning, every drum beat and every scream. Take for example the song "A Trace of Blood". It tells the true story of Daniel's wife pregnancy which ended with an abortion, and the emotions involved. The song begins with a fast and joyful keyboards line, like the emotions felt by young parents designing their happy future, it puts a smile on your face. little later the song brakes into a heavy guitar riff which overshadowes the joy, like a message that something is wrong with the fetus. The lyrical complexity of the song reaches its climax in the last chorus in which Daniel expresses his total control of language - "I never saw your face and now you're gone without a trace, except the trace of blood that's deeply scarred into my eyes to fill your place." Another good example is the remarkable duality between the songs "This Heart of Mine" and "Undertow". The first is a beautiful love song which demonstrates Daniel's diverse and fascinating language and describes his love for his wife. it begins with a calm and mellow tone as its opening words describes a quiet and peaceful scene, and slowly build up and culminates in a heart rending solo that emphasizes the emotional outburst that this song is. a perfect burst of true love. The song has two layers, the real dimension and its conceptual level as part of the album. In reality the song was written as a love song to Daniel's wife. In the album it describes the love the protagonist feels towards the Hungarian girl, the trust formed between them, the promises that were promised. At this stage of the album, the listener is not yet aware of the source of the rift in the relationship, so it looks like a sincere and genuine emotion between two people in love. Precisely for this reason, the next song seems a little odd, almost detached from reality, because it is the exact opposite of it. It's a song of pain, a song of despair, of grief, of desire for independence. the repetition of the words Let me go, let me fly, let me run, let me bleed, let me die makes the despair the hero felt clear. We still don't know what the source of this pain is, but we can feel it. This is the memory of the breaking point. The point in the relationship where the protagonist just wants to go, escape, not verbally or physically, but spiritually. He wants to be free from a lost love, the promises he had promised her, the world he created with her. The song repeats the same riff over and over. It starts quietly at first, expressing some kind of quiet even sleepy desperation, which changes the second time to grief, then anger, then panic, and finally back to despair. The real beauty in "Undertow" is that in the middle of it the melody from the second half of "This Heart of Mine" enters, as if to remind us what the source of all this pain is. Because all this time, even when the distortion goes crazy in the background, the drums roll and Daniel screames his throat to death, the memory of that perfect love is still there, in his mind, and even in moments of despair, grief and anger, it's still there, and that's exactly what the protagonist is trying to break free of. More of Daniel's ingenuity is revealed in the song "Second Love". If I'd have heared this song apart from the album, I would have said it's a typical pop song not characteristic to POS and probably wouldn'y give it any further hearings. But as part of the album its an integral part of the concept. It was written by Daniel when he was 16 and speaks exactly about the theme of the album, love and loss, with the language and simplicity of a child of 16. Daniel wanted a song that feels true and genuine, so he put it there, because it was real, real pain of a child. This album has an element of musical beauty. POS are not limited to limitations of modern music. It's sometimes difficult to distinguish a logical structure in their songs and sometimes even a uniform rhythm. Because POS does not play music like we are used to. Instead, they do what they need to do in order to express the emotion they require.they are not the kind of progressive music reflected in thousands of solos and virtuosity, they are progressive in spite of themselves, because their music too, like the human soul, changes over time, adapts to the spirit of things, made up just like the people who created it and those who hear it. Ever since I heard this album my life weren't the same anymore. I'm not listening to music the same way. In fact, this album signifies to me, above all, the last time I was really moved by music. When I hear it, and the Perfect Element to be honest, I shudder and fill with shivers. I've yet to encounter this phenomenon with any other album. I've been looking for more music like this ever since. original music originating from the soul, the kind that you connect to in so many ways that sometimes you would rather keep quiet and let it speak instead of yourself. I hear a lot of music, and I try to hear something new every week. I Have not found anything that transcends it. This is perfection.

Mixing up musical genres capturing a mixed up world.

Pain of Salvation's "Scarsick" showed a much more political side of the band that attacked the worldview and is a cynical look at the damage of consumerism, industrialisation, privatisation, McDonaldisation, and every other 'isation' you can think of. The lyrics attack and scratch out the eyes of the system that is suffocating and destroying the freedom. Every song takes a stab at various freedom destroyers from the money hungry manufacturing industry to the music industry itself. Daniel Gildenlow dominates the album on vocals and bass, and the guitar work on this is exceptional from Johan Halgreen along with Fredrik Hermansson's stirring keyboards and dramatic percussion by Johan Langell.

It begins with the indulgent title track stating that they are sick of everything. This is the most metal song on the album with a cool distorted riff and some heavy drumming. It features a rap style and Rammstein style interventions of riffs breaking it up. The lyrics are about surviving against the system that swallows up the underprivileged; "you're not alone, and every time that you hurt, every cut every scar and every time you just hate everything that you are, it is simply the instinct to flee to escape from this mess, this continuous rape of what's true and what's real, so you gnaw at your paw to get out of the trap of the cage of our time, all that rage is your struggle to survive, they think you wanna die when in truth you just strive, biting every hand just to stay alive." This is definitely the best song on the album and starts off the DVD live concert well also, the mix of rap and metal and a melodic chorus, mixing musical genres, works to capture the feeling of a mixed up world.

After this rocker, 'Spitfall' follows that is jammed full of fast paced rap and some weird signatures. I liked the way the keyboards work against the fast rap vocals such as "you're just another Parental Advisory bore, there's nothing like a broken childhood, there's nothing like a broken home, there's nothing like a tale from your hood, there's nothing like a record of restriction orders outspoken borderline disorders a violent long way to the top, the longer that you fought yourself up the longer the spitfall". There are heaps of lyrics on this due to the speed rap, but it is well executed and perhaps better than the average rap song, and has a lot of expletives thrown in too. Then 'Cribcaged' is next with too many F bombs for comfort and this is one I will always skip, as it has nothing to offer apart from just rage and spite and boring music.

They are sick of America and have no problems writing a scathing hate song to it called 'America'. I first heard this on the live DVD and I remember not being impressed with it then and this version is actually worse. It does have some nasty digs at the land of the free though such as, "if I say I love you dare you love me too". I am not sure how this song is taken in America itself but it is not one to play at the white house.

'Disco Queen' is a quirky piece of fun, with some digs at the music industry and homage to the vinyl years "Undressed in front of me, all glistening ebony, You're still so young, but I will show you vintage 33, I lay you on your back inviting curves of black, Making little noises as my needle finds your track". The disco music is humorous and a real diversion on the album, but it works as a result, standing out as unforgettable and maddeningly infectious. It effectively makes fun of the current music scene that is likened to prostitution.

'Kingdom of Loss' is a powerful track based on the abuse of fast food and increasing obesity. It has narratives sounding like a TV station selling the package and the lyrics attack the fast food market as a sold out Earth "Someone sells us god in 2-for-1 with shame, Someone sells us war and the marketing, looks just the same, Someone sells us fear on TV each day, A shape for every taste if the flavours right, we gladly pay, All on sale, all on sale, We're all on sale, all on sale"; a great thought provoking track.

'Mrs Modern Mother Mary' has a scratchy guitar rhythm and some odd time sigs that never quite go in sync with the singing. It is interesting but not one of my favourites. 'Idiocracy' has a crunching rhythm and grinds along with some high register vocals. The lyrics are anti political; "so close your eyes, just take another deep breath now, and fantasize, pretend the world we're forming is a paradise, why can't I close my eyes, why can't I just be hypnotized, industrialized and privatized, all mesmerized, 'cause I can see and what I see around me makes me paralyzed, yes I can see and what I see is not worthy a democracy."

'Flame to the Moth' is a heavier track, and yet another potshot at the industrial age, and this one has some screamo vocals along with Gildenlow's cleaner voice. The lyrics spell it out blatantly; "where did we go wrong? I once had blue eyes, hungry and wise, now they are black from this dark age of lies, we're all privatized, industrialized, we capitalize on the beams in our eyes, it's all in the eyes." The tempo is upbeat and really dominated by the incessant vocals.

'Enter Rain' is a longer song at just over 10 minutes, and has three parts that change in tempo and style. It begins with reflective lyrics and a low key approach. Then it builds gradually but remains steady and quite gentle in comparison to other tracks.

Overall, this is another diverse album from PoS with a variety of styles and some of their most attacking and vitriol lyrical content. The target is basically the world system and commercialism or consumer traps. This makes for an uneasy listen at times, not to the standard of previous material, but nonethess it is a captivating album. There is not a lot of heavy metal music on offer rather it is heavy by nature of the content and the brooding atmospheres. Not as good as "The Perfect Element" or "Remedy Lane" but a decent album worth a listen.

Back to the 70s... a new direction.

Pain of Salvation have moved into a very new territory with "Road Salt Two", and this is bound to alienate old fans while perhaps gaining new ones. It is not metal that PoS strive for on this release, more like the vintage sound of the 70s classic rock and I have no problem with that but it is nonetheless a surprise when I first encountered this. I have the DVD "Ending Themes" and a swag of albums and have become used to a variation of styles from the prog ambience and intricate metal of "Remedy Lane" to the hardcore themes and heaviness of "Scarsick", however this latest release really threw me for a loop. It has a distinct sound of its won almost like nu metal or grunge in places. There is no 'Disco Queen' on this or 'Hallelujah' but it is still innovative and as fun as previous releases, though perhaps more accessible. The poppier approach will appeal but the metalheads out there are unlikely to be impressed as there is not enough on here, it all sounds like a grunged up hard rock.

The album boasts some excellent material such as powerhouse riffer 'Mortar Grind' and a thundering hook on 'Eleven'. I am also enamoured with '1979', that delightfully sounds like it came from that year, and 'The Physics of Gridlock', with some incredible melodies, and it even features symphonic orchestral sections such as 'Road Salt Theme' and 'End Credits'. It is not the first time PoS have liked their music to a movie soundtrack and again this feels like it purposefully. I am not into the concept of the album if it even exists but overall the album delivers some compelling music.

Daniel Gildenlow dominates the album vocally and often it becomes overbearing, but there is no mistaking his basslines and the guitar work, along with some exceptional drumming of Leo Margarit. The mellotron is always welcome as is all the keyboard finesse of Fredrik Hermansson. Johan Hallgren is terrific on guitars and the band are a very tight unit as usual, never failing to surprise on this album, as one is never sure what style each track will be, such is the diversity of the material.

Overall I don't think the legion of fans will be disappointed though some may take longer to appreciate the new approach than others and that is understandable. I was quite happy with the album but it did throw me as the metal sound was really pushed to the back instead of to the foreground. It will be interesting to see where PoS will go next on subsequent releases as this one was highly experimental and creative, and not at all like previous albums.

When Pain of Salvation frontman Daniel Gildenlöw does his best to sound like Mike Patton's style (circa Faith No More's Angel Dust) on Scarsick's title track, I suppose it's something to be applauded on one level. After all, it's always healthy for bands to experiment a little with their sound and make an effort not to stagnate, and certainly the album as a whole appeals to me a little bit more than the New Agey pap of BE, but on the other hand something feels a little "off" about it - as though the band don't sincerely buy into the darker direction of the piece and are simply going through the motions to earn some metal credibility and perhaps expand their fanbase. I'm no Pain of Salvation fan but I can see how people who are might find this album to be something of a disappointment.

I seem to be entirely out of step with most people when it comes to Pain of Salvation - particularly Be, which I find incredibly irritating. Part of it is the daft, nonsensical attempt at metaphysics which the album is based on (apparently the band's conception of God is as someone with so much time on their hands they can't think up anything to do beyond smash themselves into a myriad different souls, torture themselves, kill themselves, and return to the whole... go figure), but most of it is the fact that the album plods along in the same obnoxious all flash and no sincerity vein as most of Pain of Salvation's albums. I don't mind progressive metal - there's a lot of progressive metal albums I love - but I wish people don't feel the need to be so progger than thou about it.

Like many other prog metal bands which seem to get universal praise from others, I find Pain of Salvation a very hit and miss affair. Once again, the band's histrionic and melodramatic musical style tips over the borderline into irritating cheesiness for my tastes, and the album's concept seems just as irritating preachy as One Hour By the Concrete Lake or Entropia. The studio production is impeccable, but to me that's part of the problem - the band seem to be more interested in trying out all the studio tricks they are in the simple skill of writing a good tune. Frankly, this seems to be the problem with many prog bands - they're so dedicated to being progger-than-thou that they neglect more basic skills of the rock musician's craft, to their detriment.

I wasn't too thrilled by the first two Pain of Salvation albums, but I have to admit that on The Perfect Element Part 1 things really came together for them. Drawing from a wider range of metal influences than is typical for a progressive metal band - there's even points, as on Used, where things begin to sound a bit like Faith No More (particularly when it comes to the Mike Pattonish vocals) - still, there's enough more traditionally proggy elements to the album to keep most prog fans happy.

A lot of the time I think Pain of Salvation's occasionally goofy lyrics and concepts overshadow their music, but that certainly isn't the case here - and in presenting a radically less showboaty and cheesy vision of prog metal than the genre's giants in Dream Theater do, the band do a lot to help the genre's sound emerge from the shadow of Images and Words.