MAGIC PIE: The Suffering Joy (PROGRESSIVE ROCK): review / opinion to read on Music Waves

"The Suffering Joy" is the third album of the Norwegian band The Magic Pie. Since their previous opus, Circus Of Life, the line-up has undergone only one change: the replacement of Alan Olsen's vocals by Eirikur Hauksson, singer-guitarist defected from the heavy metal band Artch. It's a minor change when you consider that the band has several lead singers and that their stylistic influences mix progressive music, hard rock and melodic metal.

And indeed "The Suffering Joy" shamelessly takes up well-known and proven recipes: a vitaminized cocktail, full of twirling electric guitars, boosted keyboards and smashing percussions. The compositions are dense, dynamic and full of rhythmic variations. Maybe a little too much so. Because, the band sometimes seems to lose the mastery of its compositions. The tracks explode like fireworks, but lose in coherence what they gain in energy. The transitions are often abrupt, leaving the listener somewhat disoriented. As for the melodies, most of them are quite ordinary and artificial.

On the other hand, the band always seems to hesitate between a muscular progressive rock (the first three parts of the sequel "A Life's Work", the first eight minutes of "Tired") and a hard rock, even pure heavy metal (fourth part of "A Life's Work", "Slightly Mad"). This blatant dichotomy is likely to put off fans of progressive music in the face of this avalanche of decibels, raging riffs, boisterous drums, a wild descent of sleeves, just like the metal fans that the Bee Gees-style backing vocals in the middle of a track are likely to surprise.

This is all the more regrettable as Magic Pie is talented and has many charms: the vocal harmonies of their three singers are often very successful, the numerous guitar soli are breathtaking, the bass is roaring, the keyboards are virtuosic and the drummer strike right and loud. A track like "In Memoriam", compact, with a vaguely disturbing Alice Cooper-like atmosphere, where it's easy to imagine oneself lost in the dark corridors of an old Victorian mansion or alone in the crypt of an old cemetery abandoned by a windy night, proves the enormous potential of this band.

But it is not enough to create the expected alchemy. "In Memoriam" is the exception. A lot of ideas and influences come together in this album (in bulk: Neal Morse, Kamelot, Queen, Eagles, Scorpions, Uriah Heep, Bee Gees, Deep Purple, ...) but badly channelled, they come to upset the listening. To confirm all its underlying qualities, Magic Pie will have to assert its own style and learn to discipline its compositions. - Official website

MAGIC PIE

THE SUFFERING JOY

PROGRESS RECORDS

PROGRESSIVE ROCK