Theater of War

Direct from America's heartland (Ohio), power metal upstarts Jacob's Dream formed in late 1994 as Iron Angel and spend three years fine tuning their classically fused Heavy/Power Metal to perfection. In 1998 the name of the band was changed to Jacob's Dream (there was another Iron Angel) and their first demo CD was released, receiving excellent reviews both in the United States and abroad. After their excellent self-titled debut in 1999 and during the recording of the new album, guitarists Gary Holtzman and Jon Noble left the band and Jacob's Dream had to look out for a new guitarist. It took the band only a few weeks to find Derek Eddleblute. With the new line-up the band now releases their second -self produced- album for Metal Blade titled "Theater Of War", containing seven new songs and the remakes of two tracks from their demo CD. The music on the new CD is more aggressive, more 80's raw production, it sounds more crushing and the song-structures are considerably more complex. The production work is much better on this album as well. Epic sounding guitars and atmospheric keys can be heard throughout the CD. "De Machina Est Deo" (great power metal song, probably the climax of the album), "Theater Of War" and "The Warning" are songs to listen to. They have songs like "Sanctuary" (another great power metal song with cool riffs), "Traces of Grace" (nice mid-tempo song) and "Critical Measurement", true headbanger treasures and with "Sarah Williams" (really a wonderful track) a great ballad. David Taylor’s high-pitched vocals sound like a perfect mixture from Warrel Dane (Nevermore) -just listen to "The Warning"- Dickinson and Geoff Tate (Queensrÿche). His extremely high voice will impress you. Check it out!