Metallic Tragedy

I discovered this band about 5 years ago. Some guy who owned this little store was playing some song I never heard before. I was very impressed and I wondered about this band and he told me it was Magic Kingdom's "Metallic Tragedy". The song sounded very good, lots of good guitar, the keyboards sounded top notch, you know the whole works that make power metal sound good.

At the time, I wasn't very used to metal like this because I knew very little about european metal at the time. However, this band got me to realize that there still is some good metal out there. I kept getting discouraged with what they promote here in my country (the U.S. what do you expect?) with all of this nu-metal and metalcore crap that keeps flooding our markets. But what I heard is something very fresh and original to me I had to listen to more. However, I could not find anything about this band anywhere which really got me disappointed. It wasn't until about a year ago when I found their cd on a website and I bought it for a very good price and I do not regret it at all.

Now on to the album. The songs are all very nicely played with amazing guitar work, made possible by Dushan Petrossi, who bares a resembling style to Yngwie Malmsteen. If you listen to it, you will see what I mean. The keyboard work on this album is also very well done, the drumming is very common to the power metal genre but good, and the singing is powerful yet very common to the genre but at the same time nothing spectacular.

The album starts out with a short instrumental track that gets you into the feel of the music. It is very melodic, short and to the point. Then it gets you to the next song "Child of the Nile". This is their only song to feature a music video from this album (you can watch it on Youtube, but it isn't very good). A nice, catchy song that gets you pumped from the very beginning. "The Iron Mask" starts out very similar in regards to speed and technical ability. Very nice song too. One of my personal favorites on the album is "Flying Pyramids". I love the intro melody. Reminds me a little of Stratovarious, but with their own uniqueness to it. It has an excellent chorus that you can sing along to if you like. The album also features some slower songs like "Barabas" and "Another Sun". "Barabas" is very dark sounding, reminding me of slower Metallica or Megadeth songs with the way the vocals are sung,but difference is that the melody is very Middle Eastern here. "Another Sun" is a very typical power metal ballad with a very nice melodic structure to it. I like the solo in this one because it sounds more emotional to me than the others. "Black Magic Castle" is an impressive instrumental track that shows off Petrossi's guitar skill. The keyboard playing in this track is also amazing. My favorite track is "Metallic Tragedy". An epic 13 minute song that leaves you in awe. It is very dramatic, bombastic, and heavy at the same time. The song also features an opera singer and death metal vocals. A very creative and unique song, worth a listen for sure.

Some of the negative features to "Metallic Tragedy" are the lyrical chesse and themes. I'll be honest, I know a lot of power metal has some chessy lyrics and themes, but some songs just make you want to laugh at some of it. The theme of this album is mostly medieval fantasy and war. The musical quality makes up for this for sure, and it really isn't that big of a deal. I just like songs that have some emotion or real topics to it. That is just me I guess, but this doesn't bother me too much. Another negative point is that some of the songs sound very similar to one another, with the exception of a few. This album has no filler, but the fast songs have similar structures with little variation to them. But that is such a small complaint that doesn't really affect the album too bad.

This is a very nice album. It sounds like a lot of typical shred and power metal, but it is still very good. If you never heard of this band before, look into this. This is high quality music and is recommended for power metal and shred guitar fans.

Power metal is alleged to be an overpopulated genre with too many bands emulating a narrow field of inspirations. It is often derided for its stylistically strict adherence to melody, speed, classical harmony, and light lyrical subject matter. However, despite a healthy influx of new acts offering very little that hasn’t already been heard before, occasionally a band decides to take some chances while simultaneously avoiding crossing over into the power/prog sub-genre.

“Metallic Tragedy” is a somewhat misleading title, as it showcases some of the most triumphant sounding melodic speed metal to come out of 2004. Much of it draws inspiration from the Neo-Baroque tonality that Yngwie Malmsteen put forth on “Marching Out” and “Trilogy”, complete with the dueling guitar and keyboard solos. The structure of the album borrows a little bit from Axel Rudi Pell’s mid to late 90s catalog, although without the mellow blues/Sabbath influences.

Guitarist Dushan Petrossi has been heralded by some reviewers as being the only true heir of Malmsteen, but on this single notion I beg to differ. Petrossi’s solos and riffs on this particular release are heavily influenced by the Swedish axe man, and he even looks a bit like Yngwie did in the mid-80s, but the extent of the repertoire on here do not take full account of the post-Marching Out eras. This music is completely devoid of the blues/rock influences found on the bulk of Yngwie’s work, and is more strictly speed metal oriented than anything else. I would amend the title attributed to Petrossi and instead call him one of many heirs to the god of shred, along with Michael Romeo, Olaf Lenk, and Roland Grapow.

Vocalist Max Leclercq resembles 90s Malmsteen vocalist Michael Vescera for most of the album, a far cry from the cleaner operatic approach he took with Fairyland a couple years later. Although he pulls his vocal lines off quite well, he is dwarfed by Oliver Hartmann, who takes lead vocal duties on two of the songs here. His vocal delivery on “Flying Pyramids” is on par with the genius that was At Vance’s album “Only Human”. The rest of the band are accomplished at their instruments and occasionally show off, but the bulk of the music on here is actually quite simple in structure and draws power mostly from the guitar work.

Among the respective tracks on here there are a couple of instant classics that demand several successive listens. “Child of the Nile” and “Black Pyramids” are the most catchy of the bunch, begging to be sung along with. “Barabas” is a solid slow and heavy track, pulling some influences from “I am a Viking” and meshing it with some eastern melodies. “Black Magic Castle” is a pretty solid homage to the Trilogy Suite, although there is a greater density in the atmosphere from the keyboards and no acoustic guitar work.

After listening through to the last track, my premises about this band as a strict Rising Force emulator were shattered. The title track of this album is like nothing I’ve ever heard before. The riffs go back and forth between power metal riffs, melodic death tremolo lines and some mixed meter turnarounds. There are 5 principle vocal parts, including a well inspired operatic soprano, a pretty good death metal vocalist and an extremely garbled sounding black metal voice. Some of this sounds like Symphony X, some like Rhapsody or Dark Moor, and during the burning of the witch character I hear some hints of Dimmu Borgir. In short, this is the most original thing to come out of the power metal genre in almost a decade, and Petrossi has left the story open for a sequel to further expand on an already quite varied mix of sounds.

Although I disagree with the lavish praise that Petrossi receives as the alleged heir of Malmsteen, this album is definitely up to the hype it received. If you are a fan of power metal influenced by the Swedish shredder, Rhapsody, Dark Moor, Concerto Moon, Fairyland, Helloween then this is definitely for you. The ending track might throw you for a loop, but give it a chance, you won’t be sorry.

I had checked this band out of curiosity, seeing how much praise it had already received and, to be short, I have been highly disappointed. Because what we have here is just the worst Stratovarius caricature we could have imagined, so much a caricature that it almost becomes funny. And don’t tell me about this awful title track – but we’ll come back to it later.

A pity, because the album began quite well with, after the generic instrumental intro, the raging Child of the Nile, four minutes of the best power metal you can expect, fast, hooking, and simply POWERFUL. Of course, one can already recognize the typical, slightly neo-classical a la Tolkki guitar style, and crystalline keyboards which seem very close to the usual Jens Johansson harpsichord sound, but who cares as far as the song is good. If the whole album had exhibited the same quality we had certainly been happy, though we won’t certainly have praised any originality.

Alas, things start to go downhill as soon as the following track, where one may begin to understand the band won’t really bring anything new and will just keeping on aping their Finnish masters, especially the guitarist and the keyboardist – so much it really becomes pure plagiarism. Bands like Mob Rules or Dragonforce at least bring their own elements (despite I dislike both of them, for different reasons), but here? This keyboard solo at the beginning of Flying Pyramids? Well I’m sure I can find exactly the same in Episode-era Stratovarius. These oriental riffs in Barabas? A complete rip-off of another Episode song, Babylon, and considering I already hate the original... The instrumental Black Castle Magic? Do you know these Stratovarius instrumental songs, you may find one of them in almost every album and it’s rather easy, the majority bears Strato- in its name. So here you have another one, except there is no Strato- in the title and, sorry, it is said to be another band playing. The worse thing here is that I’m not joking. The crappy Another Sun? Well, at least Stratovarius ballads are usually good (I’m talking about pre-Infinite Stratovarius here), and that is not.

Granted, there is one song which doesn’t sound at all like that band I’m now tired to write the name – I think you’ve understood by now – and it’s the title track. But now I’m almost regretting it, because this supposedly epic track is nothing more than a complete aborted mess. Now the band is willing to sound original (well, better late than never), and as it naturally lacks of any single bit of talent it thought it was a good idea to melt usual high-pitched power metal vocals with some (rather nice, let’s admit it) female singer, below-average growls and an utterly shitty black-metalish voice – an agonizing cat would surely be more pleasant to hear. You might imagine the result when all these “singers” sing at the same time. And concerning the music, it’s a mixture of rather repetitive guitar lines, useless bombastic keyboards, a patchwork of stupid elements like completely out-of-place ten seconds of blastbeats, with only one redeeming part, the melodic break which stands in the middle and sounds rather good. Adding on the top of that the generic knight-fighting-the-demon lyrics one gets easily the worst track on the album.

To sum up the only good idea the band had was to invite the not praised enough Oliver Hartmann to sing on a couple of songs, Flying Pyramids and Master of Madness. Now you understand how a really gifted musician can turn some rather average work to a masterpiece. As soon as Hartmann’s both melodic and slightly rough voice comes in one forgets that music is just more Stratovarius fellating, it turns in something completely different. Just listen to Flying Pyramids: impressive verses sung by Hartmann, and a chorus that almost ruins the song when the usual singer comes back. Thankfully, Master of Madness is ENTIRELY sung by Hartmann, and is the second good song on the album.

So next time, ask the great German vocalist to sing on the whole album, and you’ll probably obtain some decent piece of work. Or learn how to write your own music, it could help as well.

Highlights: Child of the Nile, Master of Madness

Thank god I bought this album!!!! As soon I put it into my CD player I was hooked. I can't really say what is the best aspect of this album is, could it be the super-fast riffs that are very reminiscent of Malmsteen or even -gasp- TOLKKI? or the drumming that is very heavy and consisted mostly of fills? maybe even the very skillful keyboard lines especially in "Flying Pyramids"? or finally and i believe this is my favourite, the guitar solos which go from super fast shredding, sweeping arpeggios to classical-style lines and also the wierd middle-eastern flavored licks on "Barabas"?
Whichever it is this albums contains songs that span the whole 20 or so years since power metal has existed in just 10 very well produced songs.
Highlights on this album are "child of the nile", "The iron mask", "flying pyramids", "master of madness" and the title track but any song on it is worth the money you're putting for it!
A must for musicians and fans of the music alike. If you have been dreading the lack of solos and musicianship of the recent years you owe it to yourself to check this album out.

This the best power metal album I heard these 5 last years,the music is so cool and the voice's melodies are just great,great musicians and a total new style of metal in the 'metallic tragedy' tune,cant wait for the next album,defenitely a legend is born,and you would be a fool not to buy this album


Stylistically Metallic Tragedy stretches from symphonic metal to speed metal to neo classical and also contains some operatic and death metal touches (more on this later). The production courtesy of Didier Chesneau is superb, strong powerful and with a great mix. Dushan is joined by vocalist Max Leclerq, bassist Vassili Moltchanov and drummer Anton Arkhipov. The band members are all very proficient on their instruments and makes this album very worthy of virtuosity status. Guesting on vocals on a couple of tracks is ex At Vance vocalist Oliver Hartmann
The album is opened by the short orchestrated instrumental Tazira's Magic Rite, which has some nice melodic soloing from Dushan before Child Of The Nile almost takes your head off with its blistering pace and winning metal glory! Included on the ltd. edition of this album is a video clip for the song which is also rather cool, this track is a strong opener and the album just gets better with the slightly Yngwie esque The Iron Mask. This is home to a great guitar riff and solo; Leclerq's vocals are superb here possessing a strong timbre. Joining for some solo keyboard exploits is Bob Katsionis who raises the musicianship yet again.

Flying Pyramids sees Oliver Hartmann enter in fine style. A great pulsating delivery with an anthemic chorus. All the traditional power metal hallmarks are here; yet it retains its freshness thanks to Hartmann's darker voice adding depth to the track. Petrossi's guitar work is again immense, frantic riffing, with plenty of great fills being used between the verses and choruses being doubled by the keyboards. The track is home to a great classical breakdown midway through before Petrossi takes flight with some great harmonic minor runs, a superb track.

Barabas shows that Petrossi knows how to pace an album, as many bands in this genre would be content to pound you with another double bass drum led assault. Luckily Barabas possesses a dark and heavy mid tempo groove. The track has a slight oriental feel to it and this adds more depth to the track. Leclerq impresses again on the track with a deeper delivery perfectly in keeping with the mood of the track. The guitar solo again shows restraint and builds from slow melodic passages to some neo-classical flurries - the transition is superb. The chorus comes in again for a final time and the track is over all too soon - stunning.

Master Of Madness sees the tempo pick up and Hartmann returns on vocals. The track is strengthend by some symphonic flurries. Lyrically the track is firmly planted in gothic fantasy imagery and the chorus reflects this with its grandiose vibe. The solo again is home to more Petrossi magic. Another track that manages to retain an individual voice in a genre that often gets very repetitive.

Black Magic Castle is an instrumental that really allows Petrossi to show what he can do on the guitar. Opening with a blistering neo-classical motif the track 2 minutes in develops into a slower tempo over which Petrossi plays some really soulful lead lines. The note choice and phrasing displayed here is perfect. The main fast theme then comes flying back in, guitar fans will love this.

Another Sun sees the band turn in a classic ballad. The structure and melodies here are again of a very high caliber. Lyrically the track is about a love affair that went bad and several years later cross words forgiven giving the chance for a friendship to happen. The chorus is superb, Leclerq again singing with great soul and passion, and these two characteristics are also prevelant in Petrossi's soul drenched solo, a definite highlight.

Time Will Tell is a bonus track that certainly doesn't sound as if its an add on. This is classic Euro Power Metal sounding fare with a strong vocal melody. Musically the track is home to some good symphonic inflections, and a great trading solo between guitar and keyboards.

The Fight is another classic sounding speed metal song with some very intricate parts. The frantic verse is given a solid grounding thanks to some simple Organ chords before the great pre-chorus is accentuated with some nice harpsichord interplay. Midway through the tracks breaks down to a mega powerful mid tempo feel, this then leads into some play with tight synchopated riffing before Dushan gives us another good solo before the chorus leads us out.

Closing the album is the epic title track Metallic Tragedy. Clocking in at over 13 minutes this track is extremely bold and original, Opening with some male choir chanting before launching into a strong power groove what is really different about this track is the vocals. We have 5 characters on this conceptual song, however this is not any old five voices, we have a soprano, a bass baritone, a black metal voice, a death metal voice and a traditional metal voice. These different textures allow a great deal of seperation and in reality sound superb! Musically the track is sublime, great pulsating riffs that go from classic metal to neo-classical intricacy and there is even the odd blast beat section here. Midway the track breaks down to a lone eerie piano over which some soft orchestration adds depth, this slowly builds into a strong classic metal riff. Around the 10 minute mark we get some solos between guitar and keyboards, well done and inkeeping with the vibe of the track. The track ends with a flurry of vocals and a few pounding chords.

Metallic Tragedy (the album) is one of the best albums in the power metal genre I have heard in a few years. Musically it manages to avoid many of the cliches in this genre, and this is no doubt a plus in my eyes. The influence of neo-classical and more extreme metal is apparent in several places and its great to hear a lead guitarist that can throw much more into their solos than the stock power metal lead lines. The use of two vocalists is somewhat of a masterstroke too, this way Petrossi has been able to get the right voice for the sound the song demands. Bottom line is that Metallic Tragedy is an album you will be a fool not to pick up.

Hot Spots : Flying Pyramids, Barabas, Another Sun, Metallic Tragedy

This is the second release of the band Magic Kingdom. It's very well-made, it's all power metal, nice riffs, nice guitars, everything is there to call it power metal.

BUT, 90% of the songs on the album are just too common. Sure, they're good, but every idea, every riff, everything has already been seen in power metal. The band didn't add any idea of their own, it's just standard boring power metal. I feel so damn bored listening to this album, I feel like listening to helloween, just worst and less fascinating. Some of the songs are quite good though(like "Metallic Tragedy", but the rest is just too boring. The vocals lack a shitload of feeling, the guy is almost talking. The lyrics themselve are nothing impressive, just boring "a long time ago when life was...", all that boring crap.

The only good thing about this album is the very fast riffs. Those parts feel different. It's a pity they only last from 10 to 30 seconds in each song, since the average length of each song is about 4-5 minutes.

Everything is very well-made, but the band just forgot about one damn thing: Adding their own ideas. The whole album feels like blind guardian covers, or dragonforce covers.

That being said, this album is weak. Only go buy it if you're a huge fan of power metal. a big NO for everyone else.