Michael Romeo ‘War Of The Worlds: Pt 1’
Album Review By Adam McCann
Music Theories Recordings – 2018 – Progressive Metal
Michael Romeo is not only a virtuoso guitarist and orchestrator, but he is also the mastermind behind one of the most prolific progressive metal bands in Symphony X. In his career, Romeo has written excellent albums such as ‘Paradise Lost’, ‘The Odyssey’ and ‘Underworld’ with Symphony X, but with the band on a seemingly extended break, Romeo has decided to keep himself busy with his second solo album ‘War of the Worlds: pt. 1’.
As the first part to a double concept album, Romeo takes in similar lyrical stylings to that of the Symphony X album ‘Iconoclast’ and adds a musical score that would certainly not be out of place on a big budget Hollywood movie. This results in Romeo providing some of his best orchestral scoring since ‘The Odyssey’ and ‘V: The New Mythology Suite’ with tracks such as ‘Djinn’, ‘Constellations’ and ‘Black’ standing out as superb. Furthermore, ‘War…’ not only contains some of Romeo’s best orchestrations, but also has the feeling of being the best Symphony X album that has been available since ‘Underworld’.
‘War…’ is not only fantastic, it is certainly one of the best albums of the year, it shows that Romeo can be taken out of his Symphony X comfort zone and through this, Romeo has not only excelled himself but has also proved that he can deliver an album beyond the constrains of his band because of this, ‘War…’ is an album which for any progressive metal fan is a must buy this year.
Rating : 90/100
MHF Magazine/Adam McCann
