lukretion In the mid 1990s, Edguy took the power metal scene by surprise, releasing a handful of albums that, despite the band’s young age (they were merely 18 years old when they released their breakthrough album Vain Glory Opera), sounded as professional, consummated and mature as those released by some of the giants of the genre. Mandrake is Edguy’s fifth album and follows closely in the footsteps of the band’s previous releases, offering once more their trademark blend of energetic but melodic power metal. It’s a solid album that does not cover much new ground but rather consolidates Edguy’s position as a great up-and-coming power metal band.

Edguy is not the band you should be turning to if you are looking for groundbreaking or innovative songwriting. The band’s songwriting moves within a fairly well-defined canon and never strays too far from it. Edguy’s sound is heavily influenced both by the German speed/power metal tradition (Helloween) and by the classic international heavy metal sound (Iron Maiden, Judas Priest). The band’s true strength lies in the mastery with which they manage to blend these influences into tasteful and classy numbers that rarely fail to impress the listener. Mandrake is no exception in this regard. Indeed, the record’s biggest selling point is probably the class with which the band manage to navigate between their influences across the ten songs of the album. The album moves impeccably through breakneck speed metal assaults (“Golden Dawn”, “All the Clowns”, “Fallen Angels”), epic Maidenian mid-tempos (the strong opener “Tears of a Mandrake”, “The Pharaoh”), classic 1980s heavy metal belters (the outstanding “Nailed to the Wheel”) and mellow ballads (“Wash Away the Poison”). There are even a couple of episodes of hard rock-infused metal (“Painting On the Wall”, the Europe-influenced bonus track "The Devil & the Savant"), while the comedy metal piece “Save Us Now” (aka “Highspeed Alien Drum Bunny”) offers a surprisingly humorous closure to the album. This diverse material ensures that the listener never gets bored or feels as though the songs are repetitive.

The quality of the playing is remarkable. Guitarists Jens Ludwig and Dirk Sauer exchange plenty of fun riffs and solos. The rhythm session is rock solid and especially drummer Felix Bohnke displays some impressive chops, particularly when the tempo speeds up. However, Edguy’s secret weapon is undoubtedly singer Tobias Sammet. He has an expressive and distinctive voice that is convincing both when he uses his gritty mid range snarl and when he reaches for the high notes. He reminds me of both Michael Kiske and Bruce Dickinson, which is quite an achievement in and of itself. Apart from contributing a strong vocal performance, Sammet is also Edguy’s main songwriter and for that he is rightly recognized as one of the most significant personalities in the power metal scene.

The production is also very good. The album was mixed and mastered at Finnvox studios by expert sound engineers Mikko Karmila and Mika Jussila. They gave the album a clean sound that does not sacrifice neither power nor detail. My only criticism is that the albums sounds a tad too loud. I would have liked to hear more dynamics in the music, but instead nearly all of the album keeps the pedal firmly to the metal, which inevitably fatigues me in the long-run.

Overall, Mandrake delivers exactly what one would expect it to deliver: 60 minutes of high-octane melodic power metal that subsumes the best influences of the European heavy metal tradition with class and style. There are no weak spots or fillers on this album. Each track is an energetic slab of headbanging heavy metal fun, with plenty of catchy (yet not cheesy) choruses to sing along to. Edguy do not invent anything new on this album, nor do they push any boundaries. In this sense, this album is far from the masterpiece some people say it is. But if you are okay with that and just want to spend one hour of classic undiluted heavy metal, then Mandrake will not disappoint.

[Also published on https://www.metal-archives.com]

Kingcrimsonprog There’s a very handy Metallica comparison that works when thinking about Edguy. So, Kingdom of Madness is the Kill ‘Em All of the discography, a more raw and charming affair that wears its influences loud and proud and is fun but not yet fully developed. Vain Glory Opera is like Ride The Lightening, a more mature and uniquely them record that starts showing off their ambition while still rocking. Theater Of Salvation is Master Of Puppets, the magnum opus, the really grand and ambitious album that contains amazing, well constructed and monstrously catchy songs. The Savage Poetry is …And Justice For All, the follow up to their best album and almost as good in its own right.

All of that brings me to what I’m trying to say here. Mandrake is their Black Album. After four albums in one particular style and tone, the band decide to mature off in a new direction and break out of the confines of their home genre. Like The Black Album still had some Thrash songs on it like ‘Struggle Within’ and ‘Through The Never,’ Mandrake has some pure Power Metal songs on it like ‘Painting On The Wall,’ ‘Golden Dawn’ and ‘Save Us Now.’ Even then, sometimes when it does do traditional Power Metal, its more of a Master Of The Rings vibe than a Keeper Of The Seven Keys vibe if you know what I mean. Just listen to the little skiffly drumstick solo and high pitched comedy vocal in the middle of ‘Save Us Now’ to see what I mean.

Largely however, Edguy find themselves testing the limitations of their German Melodic Power Metal roots. ‘Painting On The Wall’ and its more progressive big brother ‘Tears Of A Mandrake’ have some very Bon Jovi and Detonater-era Ratt sounding influences audible on them, its no the whole picture but it is one colour they’re painting with. ‘Jerusalem’ sees them blending their Power Metal stylings with a more commercial Hard Rock vibe foreshadowing where they’d go on their next album. ‘The Pharaoh’ is a ten minute epic with an eastern vibe that sounds like a mixture between Sabaton when they get slow and stompy and when Rainbow would go eastern sounding like on ‘Babylon’ and ‘Tarot Woman.’ ‘Nailed To The Wheel’ although opening up acoustically with some very different vocal melodies than Edguy usually go for, evolves into the fastest most pissed-off Thrash Metal like song the band had put out to date. If you get the version with bonus tracks, ‘The Devil & The Savant’ also has a touch of Glam to it. Not the whole picture again, but its there. Its the band testing their boundaries.

The production job also has a lot to do with it. This album has a much more full, bright, unmetallic sheen to it. Commercial is the word best to describe it really. Its good in its own way but it sounds quite different to where they’d been living in previously.

Like with Metallica, there are lots of fans who consider The Black Album the last of the classic-five and there are other purists who think there was only a classic four and this is the first one afterwards. Of course, there are also a large amount of fans I’ve discovered online who prefer the band in their more Hard Rock form and say things like ‘Yeah, they got good when they stopped trying to sound like Iron Maiden’ and even those guys are also split on this record, because its not quite the Pure Power Metal style and its not quite not either.

Overall; Mandrake is a very good album, and a very interesting album, but whether you’ll like it or not very much depends on what you wanted out of it in the first place. The production job may be off putting if you wanted a certain thing, as may be the songwriting for about half of it. The songwriting on the other half may be off putting if you wanted a different thing. Vocals, guitar solos, drum patterns and creativity are all above reproach, its just the sound and musical direction that people are divided over.

Kingcrimsonprog Edguy were in an interesting position at the turn of the millennium. Starting the group as a bunch of wide-eyed teenagers in the early to mid ’90s, Tobias Samet and the rest of the boys who would go on to become legends of German Melodic Power Metal, were initially a rough an ready influences-worn-on-sleeves kinda band. They released a demo quality debut album called Savage Poetry in 1995 and then through years of practice and touring went on to become a leading force in Power Metal and one of the finest to be doing it at the time. After releasing their absolute magnum opus Theater Of Salvation in 1999 and being considerably more famous and beloved, fans kept asking if they would reissue Savage Poetry which had long since been out of print. Doing them one better, the band took all the talent, skills and confidence they’d been developing over the years and remade the album. No reissued, not re-recorded, but remade entirely.

Everything is different here, new artwork, new logo, new track order, new guitar solos, heck even the bassist and drummer are new when you think about it as neither were on the original version. They added a ‘The’ to the title as well, that’s new. Essentially, what happened was the band listened to these old songs and then wrote them again in 1999 as only the band who had released Theater Of Salvation could have. What resulted was a mix of old and new, that ticks all the right boxes to sound classic and modern, naive and accomplished, charming and sophisticated. There’s a duality to it that works as well as your go to metaphor (be that chocolate and peanut butter, tits and dragons or whatever people are saying these days, the point is the two compliment each-other despite seeming like different worlds).

For most people this is just some handy background information for a pub quiz however because unless you go out of your way, you aren’t hearing the 1995 version easily and the differences between the two versions are therefore largely academic. Regardless, because this is Edguy in 1999 we’re talking about here, this is an absolutely superb album not to be missed by Edguy fans, or indeed anyone with an interest in this style of music. If you listen to Gamma Ray, Helloween, Hammerfall, Blind Guardian, Freedom Call, Sonata Arctica, Stratovarius or anyone of that nature, you really want to get up on this album. I would be so bold as to say The Savage Poetry is either the band’s second best, or sometimes if I’m feeling generous, joint-first best studio album.

There are a lot of similarities between this and Theater Of Salvation. They were both recorded around the turn of the millennium at Rhoen Studios in Fulda, Germany, and were both self produced by the band, with the same line-up. They both feature a mixture of Maiden and Priest influenced speed metal sections, bombastic grandiose sections with pianos and choral singing, and then some occasional ballads, and happy Helloween-influenced melodies. They both come before the band went a bit more Hard Rock in direction and they both come before the band started letting their humour play a big part.

Highlights include the speedier more metallic tracks ‘Sacred Hell’ and ‘Misguiding Your Life’ as well as the slow stompy Hammerfall-esque opener ‘Hallowed’ and possibly best of all, the diverse multi-faceted ten-minute ‘Eyes Of The Tyrant.’

The album works really well from start to finish, the two ballads break things up (and are surprisngly tasteful), the longer tracks take you on a little journey and then the rest of the album gets its head down and delivers exactly what you love about the band perfectly, only with a little bit more of a NWOBHM gallop than usual.

Overall; be sure not to miss out on one of the band’s absolute finest hours. If you like the glorious melodic guitar lines, crunchy riffs and pounding drums of Edguy at their most metallic, this is seriously up there as one of the finest examples of that. If you like the band being adventurous and writing long complex stuff, that’s here too. If you like them when they drop some ballads, these are some of the band’s best. If you’re tempted by the band but scared off by the more commercial Hard Rock stuff or the comedy stuff there’s none of that here. This is the band at their best, with some damn fine songs and a sterling production job, updating some charming old songs into an absolute beast of an album. Highly recommended!

Kingcrimsonprog Ask me what either the best or my favourite album by Edguy is and nine times out of ten I’ll tell you its Theater Of Salvation (the other one time its the 2000 remake version of The Savage Poetry). Ask me what my favourite Edguy song is and one hundred out of one hundred times I’ll tell you its ‘Babylon.’ Heck, I’ll probably tell you that uninvited most days because I’m just that enthusiastic about it.

Something magical was in the air in 1999 when the German Power Metal band burst out of Rhoen Studios in their homeland of Fulda. Their first two albums showed potential. Vain Glory Opera saw them truly find themselves. Then they absolutely cemented their legacy with this magnificent release. Talk about knocking it out of the park. It was their first record with the famous rhythm section of Tobias Exxel and Felix Bohnke on bass and drums respectively, who’ve been there ever since.

The album begins strongly with the aforementioned ‘Babylon’ and ends on a high with the 12-minute diverse mini-epic Title Track. There’s some nice speedy heavy Power Metal tunes in ‘Arrows Fly,’ ‘The Headless Game’ and the excellent ‘Falling Down’ (another of the must-hear tracks here). There’s some slower quieter moments too with ballad ‘Another Time’ and power ballad ‘Land Of The Miracle.’ If you only like Power Metal at its most pounding and chest beating, these two might be a bit wet for your tastes, but they add variety.

As you can see from a lot of those titles, there’s a sort of religious theme going on here. It doesn’t just show up lyrically but also in the keyboards and vocals a lot. You know how ‘Suite Sister Mary’ by Queensryche has a sort of religious sound to it? That sort of thing, but if that was dark, this is very very bright and colourful and shiny. You may think, “well how the heck does that fit into Power Metal? I can’t imagine a mixture between the background music in The Borgias and the galloping of Iron Maiden” but I assure you it gels really well with these particualr songs and how the band have constructed them.

Speaking of vocals, these would have to be in the running for a career best from mainman Tobias Sammet. Its a very different style to whats used in their later more hard rock albums like Rocket Ride and Tinnitus Sanctus, and slightly less adventourous than his work in his other project Avantasia, but it is really one of the finest recorded examples of the pinnacle of him/the band doing this style of music.

There are other Edguy albums that show off raw charm, that show off adventure, or that go down fun and silly routes. If you want them at their absolute perfect core, with their absolute best set of brilliantly made and catchy, memorable and musically impressive songs, then go for Theater Of Salvation every time. This album for me is up there in the pantheon of absolute Power Metal greats. When I’m thinking of Keeper Of The Seven Keys, Nightfall In Middle Earth, Land Of The Free, Glory To The Brave and their likes, I’m definitely thinking of Theater Of Salvation too.

Kingcrimsonprog Edguy are a Power Metal band from Germany, headed up by Tobias Samet (also known for Avantasia), and Hellfire Club is their sixth album. The 2004 effort is one of their best in terms of enjoyability and quality, and is interesting in their discography looking back, as it serves as a bridge between their Power Metal early days and their Hard Rock tinged later days, and also sees the band’s silly side come a bit more to the fore.

There are some very fine Power Metal moments on here, and there are some very fine Hard Rock-ifed moments. There are also some tracks that balance them both, in a mature and semi-progressive way similar to their previous album, 2001’s Mandrake, most notably the ten-minute ‘The Piper Never Dies.’ Its sort of a great midpoint between their various different styles and ambitions without being too far in any one direction and therefor it is very originally Edguy without any influences hanging obviously off sleeves.

The production job on the album is very big and radio ready, matching the stadium-focused choruses that have started to find their way in to the music. A huge memorable chorus like that of single ‘Lavatory Love Machine’ (a song about ‘the mile high club’ with a comic lyrical style) sounds gigantic on this record. Its a far cry from the thin and wirey dueling guitars of classics from Theater Of Salvation (a production style perfect in its own right, but for very different music). The band are fleshed out by a guest orchestra which gives things a bit of extra depth and bombast.

Highlights include ‘Down To The Devil’ which has a fiendishly catchy chorus, as well as the foot-to-the-floor ‘We Don’t Need A Hero’ which is one of the better tunes on here and the guitar work is noteworthy. Lastly, the cheesily-titled ‘The Rise Of The Morning Glory’ which I feel is the exact mid point of every thing going on here and the go-to tester track you should listen to if you want to get an idea of whether or not you’d enjoy this.

Overall; this is definitely one of the band’s better albums in terms of sheer song quality, riffs, memorable choruses and big hooks. Its not their most traditionally Power Metal release ever but isn’t so far away from the formula that it would be off-putting either like some of their albums **Cough**Tinnitus Sanctus**Cough** (and what it lacks in that department it makes up for in creativity and fun). The orchestral addition adds a lot, and the production is humongous.

Ps. If you can, try and get the version with bonus tracks so you can hear Kreator’s Mille Petroza join in on ‘Mysteria’ as well as the bonus track ‘Children Of Steel’ which is one of the most traditional Heavy Metal songs the band have written to date.