These Norwegian dudes gave me a hard time, I have to admit. Though I had all the good vibes in the world to listen to this album, in the end I was really tired. Sadly Of Mind And Fantasy is one of those scenarios of moving around all the time but going nowhere albums.
The band was formed in 1998 by Niclas Nesmoht Thomsen and Kenneth Motvind Hansen, along with Nesmoht's brother, Jesper Jaz Thomsen, soon after inducted for the keyboard role. Subsequently drummer Hjaran Pukk Berge and bassist Kjetil Berge rounded out the lineup. The band entered the studio with producer Morfeus of Limbonic Art to lay down the 2000 demo Forever. Shortly after the completion of these sessions, Berge made his exit and Andrθ Chain Trevland assumed the bass position. Having recorded the debut Shadows In The Mirror album, Hεvar Wormdahl joined as second guitarist. During recording sessions in January of 2004 for a new album Of Mind And Fantasy the band parted ways with guitarist Inge Thorin Eidsaeter. The band also lost keyboard player Jesper Jaz Thomsen in June and then lost the services of guitarist Motvind the following month. Despite this turbulance, the group still managed to sign a new deal with Facefront Records and, shortly afterwards, persuaded Jesper Thomsen to rejoin. Lars Solbakken was revealed as the new rhythm guitarist shortly after.
We all know how crazy a band can sound when it comes from Norway. Too many examples to be mentioned here (Ok, I'll go with Conception and Pagan's Mind). Arch Nemesis try to play something but their problem is they tend to extend this something too much for their abilities. What starts as power / classic Metal soon fuses with progressive, atmospheric, oriental rythms, grunts... you get the picture, right? Unfortunately they can really hold two watermelons under one arm.
The outcome is lengthy compositions (without any good reason for being that lengthy) really working on my nerves at times. The album is full of good ideas but they stay as ideas. In only a few occasions the band seems to achieve plauing what they had in mind. It really took a lot of patience to listen to the entire album more than four times (yeah, that's the number of times I listen to an album before I start speaking my mind) and I really held myself back from pushing the next button on my CD player.
It seems that Arch Nemesis need time to realize what they really want to play.