MABOOL - THE STORY OF THE THREE SONS OF SEVEN

I came across Orphaned Land completely by chance. I was looking at Progressive Death Metal type videos on youtube, and it was in one of the related videos. I am SO glad that I stumbled upon Orphaned Land. So far, Mabool is the only album I've been able to listen to, and it is a vision of perfection. The progressiveness in Mabool comes in its artistic and unique use of traditional elements. It just has so many different things to add to the pot, so many memorable sounds. I am a huge fan of traditional music, basically whatever it is, Folk music from Norway, Old symphonies from the 1800s, bagpipe music, etc. In Orphaned Land's case, it is Middle Eastern Music, which is some of the most Enchanting. It brings the feelings of those old legends from the Middle East that you've heard of... the magic of the One Thousand and One Nights (or Arabian Nights) ...stories like Aladdin and old biblical tales.

It of course combines this with a good dose of heavy metal, in particularly death metal. For the longest time I hated Death Metal growling vocals, until I realized that its use can sometimes add to the drama or feeling to it, and that it was a very artistic way to sing if you did it properly, which got me into bands such as Opeth. In fact, Orphaned Land is kinda Opeth like, in my opinion. But it has a constantly melodic side that does not seem to be unbalanced with the death metal. Death growls, clean vocals, choruses, and Female singers are used perfectly together.

On top of the excellent musicianship, comes the incredible story that is told along this album. This album is a Rock Opera, which flows constantly together, narrating the story of the Three Sons of Seven. These sons are the sons of the Abrahamic religions, who try to warn people about the coming flood, to no avail. In a way, the story kinda reminds me of Ayreon's The Final Experiment except a different musical style, and different setting.

This is an album of perfection, the only thing though is that because it is a rock opera that flows together with one another, you don't really remember a single song out of all the others... You just remember what the general album sounded like as you listened to it through, and therefore, it's hard to tell which songs you love and which you don't care about. You'll have a hard time listening to a single song because you don't like to split up the storyline, etc. And you can't think of which one to listen to, because all the songs are incredible. A lot of rock operas are like this, and few rock operas have single songs that are capable of being on their own. This is not a problem at all... it's just that at least for me, I have to listen to this album from beginning to end all the time, I can never pick out a song from it.

Nevertheless this is an amazing album, a pure masterpiece. It's a wonder it is not THAT well known. It definitely should be. Then again, people nowadays seem to not understand how to appreciate true art, which is why prog is underground now... lol.

VISION OF PERFECTION.

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