SONS OF SEASONS — Magnisphyricon (review)

SONS OF SEASONS — Magnisphyricon album cover

Album · 2011 · Progressive Metal

3/5 · 2011-07-05
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Magnisphyricon is the second album release from German metal band Sons of Seasons, which is led by Oliver Palotai (Kamelot, Doro). It was released in 2011. The music of Sons of Seasons is a combination of Symphonic, Progressive, and Power Metal, so there are a lot of styles going into this package. The band’s line-up has been expanded on the album to include Pepe Pierez as a second guitarist, but otherwise remains unchanged. Like with their debut album Gods of Vermin there is a guest vocal appearance from Epica’s Simone Simons.

The band first caught my attention with their debut Gods of Vermin and under false pretences. Being a fan of Epica, and seeing Simone Simons in the band pictures for Sons of Seasons, as well as appearing on the cover art for the special edition of the debut, I assumed that she’d joined a second band. Needless to say because it turned out she was only a guest I got off slightly on the wrong foot with the debut, and needed a few listens to really get into it, and even then it wasn’t the most impressive debut I’d ever heard. So cue Magnisphyricon, and my hopes that the band will be able to do better this time around.

To cut this review short, no they can’t. But I guess you’re going to want to know more about the album than that right? Well you will at least if you haven’t heard their music before, if you’re familiar with Gods of Vermin already then you can feel safe to stop reading with the knowledge that the album is neither better nor worse than its predecessor and breaks no new ground for the band. So if you liked Gods of Vermin, you’ll like this one to, providing that the fact that the band broke no new ground doesn’t bother you.

The album is a good one, but it just never becomes a great one and does seem to drag after awhile since it’s a pretty long album at over an hour. The main problem with the length is that aside from the surprisingly strong second from last track 1413 the band delivers the best compositions early on in the album with Bubonic Waltz, Soul Symmetry and Sanctuary (which is the song with Simone Simons lead vocals), and this doesn’t leave much to look forward to from therein. In all honesty for the amount of really good songs between the band’s first two records they probably have enough material for one solid album, but it seems so far that they are stretching themselves too thinly and much of Magnisphyricon has ended up as filler.

On that note it is worth pointing out that although there are fourteen tracks on the album, there are only actually eleven songs as the three songs that begin with Magnisphyricon (Temperance, Adjustment and The Aeon) are actually an intro and two interludes, the latter pair don’t even clock in at a full minute of music, and Magnisphyricon: The Aeon goes one better in that it doesn’t even reach thirty seconds. The intro track Magnisphyricon: Temperance works for what it is worth, being a symphonic intro piece for the album, but the other two are next to useless.

The musicianship is pretty good however. The core of the band’s sound is symphonic metal although they often strip it back to give more prominence to the heavy power metal riffing, and the progressive flairs in the music are a welcome addition as it allows some interest to be kept in what otherwise can be considered a mostly bland release. Henning Basse provides a good vocal, but in the latter half of the album the band starts incorporating some harsher vocals, which do not fit in with their style at all. The album ends on a duff note though with the ballad Yesteryears, making the Magnisphyricon experience very anticlimactic and the song is easily the most boring emotionless ballad on a metal album I ever came across.

There’s not really much more to say about Magnisphyricon. The album is not outright terrible or anything despite the need for some major trimming down, but if Gods of Vermin didn’t do anything for you I can’t see this one changing your mind. It’s enjoyable to a point, and the few standouts save it from total mediocrity, but I think the band is going to need to up their game a lot for their next album.

(Originally written for Heavy Metal Haven, scoring 6.2/10)