The track titles for "The War Is In My Mind" are a very good indication as to the nature of the album - very, very random. Unfortunately, that's not a good thing. The album does have some good moments, but they're sandwiched between all the other bits that just feel like they're been crushed together haphazardly.

A fully instrumental album (well, apart from the vocals on the bonus track) is something very difficult to pull off, in my opinion. You've got to do enough to keep the listener interested, but not so much that you bamboozle them and all the songs meld into one. Fortunately "The War Is In My Mind" falls somewhere in the middle of these two extremes, as it did keep my attention for the duration, but the individual tracks were distinctive enough that it didn't feel like a 52 minute long song. It could have been very easy for Pala to fall into a trap of just doing the same thing for 12 tracks, especially since he was the only one working on the album, but luckily he's avoided this, as I've said. So yeah, the album never gets boring, but on the other hand, it's maybe a little too eccentric for my tastes. There are lots of different bits, from lots of different genres, and I just don't think the album flows very well. It feels disjointed, and random, and all over the place and that unsettles me.

I mean, don't get me wrong, Gabriele Pala is obviously a very talented musician, especially on the guitar, and this is his third full length album so it's not as if he's a complete newbie, but the album as a whole just didn't sit well with me. Technically, it's a good album (apart from the programmed drums sounding a little bit too fake), but the actual execution is where it falls down, in my opinion. Obviously, this album features some Progressive elements, and whilst that genre isn't known for its predictability, but most of it has at least has some logic to it, whereas "The War Is In My Mind" seems to be the 'unpredictable' side of things in all its glory. And I know that this may appeal to some people but definitely not to me.

So I think that my conclusion is - if you like completely instrumental albums, then you should give this a look, you may end up liking it. And if you don't, well I don't think this will change your mind any time soon.