Triumph Or Agony seems to be viewed as the weakest release in the band's catalogue, and it's certainly not as good as what has come in the past. One reason is that there's very little speed here; at times, it almost seems like a selection of fantasy ballads, with choirs and orchestras added.
And there's a choir and orchestra, to be sure. The sound of Rhapsody is all here, as is the story of a band of adventurers trying to find a powerful book before the evil Nekron does. And all this culminates in the five-part, sixteen-minute (there's always got to be one of them) "The Mystic Prophecy Of The Demonknight". There's certainly little wrong with this sometimes mighty piece of music, and, along with a few other guest actors (including Susannah York), we have Christopher Lee returning to do the narration. Naturally, he is magnificent.
Earlier on, "Old Age Of Wonders" and "The Myth Of The Holy Sword" (two parts of "Legend And Myth Of The Emerald Sword") are charming in their folk leanings, but the album lags badly in other places, like Fabio Lione's composition "Il Canto Del Vento", while there are times when the choir will suddenly come in chanting what I presume is an Italian refrain, and it almost seems like Turilli and Alex Staropoli thought they'd better throw them in somewhere, to stop things from getting too mundane.
Triumph Or Agony is a step down for Rhapsody Of Fire, as well as Turilli's other two projects in the same year, but it still has some excellent moments that help it to be far from a lost cause. However, it would be four years before the band would release their next album, thanks to legal wrangles as well as extra-carricular activities of Turilli, Lione and Staropoli.
Then the naming of the band business would get even more confusing.
***1/2
No comments:
Post a Comment