Blind Guardian – Somewhere Far Beyond

Let's face it: like any genre of music, power metal is filled with mediocre pretenders to the throne and uninspired, formulaic imitators who seem to be more concerned with hitting all the necessary, established bullet points, than with trying to be truly inspired. Bands like Nocturnal Rites or Hammerfall may have the requisite clean, melodic vocals, galloping rhythms, and harmonized guitar leads that, by all rights, _should_ sound awesome, but there's just something amiss. This is not the case with Blind Guardian, one of an elite group of bands classified as power metal/symphonic power metal (see also Rage, Angra, the founding fathers Helloween, Virgin Steele, Symphony X) which somehow have managed to bring something important and distinctive to an ever more overcrowded table.

Perhaps it was Blind Guardian's roots in both American thrash/speed (Metallica, most notably), and the more traditional pan-English Channel sounds of classic metal/proto-metal such as Iron Maiden, Rainbow and Judas Priest (with more than a little touch of 1970s Scorpions in the mix) which has kept them sounding relatively grounded while still reaching for the high peaks of Middle Earth with their fantasy-laden, orchestrated ambitions. After 2 albums of slightly progressive, somewhat epic, and definitely rough around the edges thrash/speed metal in the late 1980s, 1990's "Tales From the Twilight World" saw the band add a significant enough amount of harmony and melody to the mix to be considered part of the then-nascent power metal movement. That being said, the drumming, rhythms, and song structures were fairly linear, and still more in tune with speed metal. With "Somewhere Far Beyond", however, the band took another step forward in songwriting, and perfected their brand of power metal that they had began forging on the prior album.

The opening track, "Time What Is Time", signifies this, with dramatic shifts constantly occurring, from the quiet acoustic intro, to mid-tempo sections, to full-on speed riffing. Both vocal and guitar harmonies are liberally applied throughout, while the grinding rhythm guitars are given space to apply a heavier, more grinding edge, and the drumming is allowed to move around the shifting song structure. Things are much less chaotic here than, say, "Lost In The Twilight Hall" from "Tales". This sets the pace for a nicely varied set list, including the frantic, dark "Ashes to Ashes", the sweeping and symphonic mid-tempo song "Theater of Pain", and the speedy "Journey Through The Dark". "The Bard's Tale: In the Forest" deserves special note as perhaps the essential defining moment for Blind Guardian's acoustic, medieval balladry, with a guaranteed audience participation moment for all their shows from that point on.

And with the epic title track, with subject matter drawn from Stephen King's Dark Tower novels, the band somehow manages to bring an energetic, street-level honesty in their approach that allows the listener to give them the benefit of the doubt when Hansi earnestly declares, "I am the narrator, and now I'll tell you where I've been, and what I saw, and how it ends!"- something that I was not quite able to do when Savage Circus tried to tread the same exact ground with their song "Of Doom and Death". The only real misstep here is the pointless bagpipe filler track, "The Piper's Calling". There are also a few pseudo-bonus tracks, such as a cover of Satan's "Trial By Fire", as well as the "official" bonus tracks for this release, demos of "Time What Is Time" and "Ashes to Ashes" (the latter of which includes a fairly different instrumental break in the midst of the song). As far as audio quality, there's more kick to the low end overall, and the guitars seem to have more heft and aggression, in addition to the requisite increase in volume.

There's no doubt in my mind that this is a classic of the genre (even if I prefer Imaginations From The Other Side myself), and the remastered version gives it the audio boost to really hammer its power home. While bands like Edguy would later make a career out of imitating Helloween, and Rhapsody (aka Rhapsody of Fire) would clumsily manhandle fantasy subject matter by bludgeoning the listener with blatant Dungeons and Dragons exposition masquerading as "lyrics", Blind Guardian quietly (or not so quietly) staked out their own territory early on, and this is as good an example of that as any. And hey, even if you disagree with me, you have to it that at least it's better than Dragonforce........