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Omen > Reopening the Gates > Reviews
Omen - Reopening the Gates

Open Wide the Panthera’s Cage - 60%

bayern, May 10th, 2018

This “escape to nowhere” the band did in the late-80’s, which was essentially a vanishing act for the time being, was a fatal blow to their career, first because of the dubious quality of the material offered, and second due to the lack of an excuse follow-up, something along the lines of Celtic Frost’s “Vanity/Nemesis”, for instance. The guys simply hid from sight leaving things quite messy in their camp… it’s really sad, this turn of events, cause this fourth instalment could have been the band’s breakthrough, something what “Kings of Metal” was for their compatriots Manowar, for example; alas, this mellow quasi-progressive direction they took was just too meek compared to the rowdy battle hymns they made their name with earlier. Not willing to follow the “technicalize or thrasherize” trajectories that became fashionable in the late-80’s, the guys folded.

They stayed down for nearly a decade when the album reviewed here appeared, with only the band founder Kenny Powell remaining from the original line-up. From the new team one will invariably notice the presence of Greg Powell… yes, Kenny’s son, who takes over the vacated place behind the mike, and also provides second guitar to his father’s axeman duties. So how have our favourite epic power metallers chosen to entertain the capricious 90’s audience?

The answer to this question won’t please the band’s old fanbase as Kenny Powell and Son… sorry, Co. have voted to go with the flow, and as a result have produced one of the more faithful copies to Pantera’s “Vulgar Display of Power” and Machine Head’s “Burn My Eyes” from that period. In other words, expect heavy punishing modern post-thrash for more than half the time with an added boost by Greg’s forceful, angry shouty vocals. Truth be told, things can’t possibly get any heavier than the seismic steam-rolling rhythms of the opening “Dead March”, a formidable squasher that will easily qualify for the two mentioned albums, but by 1997 the bouncy groovy approach, regardless of how belligerent it has been made here, had long since outstayed its welcome on the scene, and the unflinching adherence to it wasn’t exactly a sign of ambition and advancement. The more dynamic riffage on “Chained” may liven up the situation for a bit, but help in this direction doesn’t arrive in heaps; instead, the band turn to either doom (“Rain Down”, the title-track) or to downright friendly jumpy alternative ala Helmet (“Everything”) to keep the proceedings immersed in heaviness and also monotony, one that doesn’t get dissipated till the end if we exclude the more interesting combination of melody and more energetic jolts on “Into the Ground”.

If this was an attempt to revive the Omen cult then it was a miserable failure on all counts. If it was intended as a reverential nod to the ruling aggro/groovy/numetal forces, the most likely option, then it worked to a fair extent. Still, such a nod wasn’t expected to arrive from the Omen camp, and no matter how angry, heavy and groovy this effort sounds, it may leave a solid aftertaste in the listener’s mouth, and not only in the one of the devoted band followers. Its generic nature is not easy to bypass although fans of the earlier mentioned acts would readily swallow it largely cause it stayed closer to the initial groovy post-thrashy canons than the more aggressive and dynamic “The Great Southern Trendkill”, and the too heavy and stiff “The More Things Change…”. Besides, in 1997 such tricks still worked provided that the old school resurrection movement only existed on paper, and our veterans here took a full advantage of the situation.

To whose advantage, though, you may ask? As the band never followed up with a similarly-styled recording. One may fail to see clearly the purpose of this album; it was hardly an endeavour on Kenny’s side to launch his son’s career as the latter only had one stunt, with the hardcore stalwarts Stomping Ground, after that. This opus was more of a missed opportunity from Powell to help in the conflagration of the retro metal revival and join the new forces on the US power/speed metal circuit like Steel Prophet, Mystic Force, Cauldron Born, Spirit Web, etc. Paying a tribute to a nearly sinking ship was not a very wise step, and he realized his mistake in time, a sign of which was the sequel “Eternal Black Dawn” that came out six years later, and finally featured some pretty decent classic power metal.

A return to form of some sorts, this last opus didn’t enjoy an immediate follow-up although it became clear later that Powell had kept the entire line-up from the last recording; under the circumstances, it remains a mystery why he had to wait for whole 13 years before striking again… how damaging this last so far outing was, is debatable as it again was a cool albeit hardly exceptional entry into the American old school power metal roster. Not to worry, the guys are still warming up… and definitely not for the opening of another heavy, creaky groovy gate from the 90’s metal zoo.