Can't believe it: it's already been nearly 10 years since No Limits was released! Time passes that fast... At least, bands like this significant Italian Metal quintet (or sixtet?) really know how to utilize both the power of experience and the innocence of talent. If you haven't shopped your first best of 2005 so far, here's the real thing. Labyrinth shine like the sun on a cloudy day, you've got nothing to be afraid of! Even without Olaf...
...who (Olaf Thorsen) may have left the band, still Labyrinth are alive and kicking! Not much had been announced concerning the band's status lately, but that's not a disadvantage for this act. The peak of their creativity maybe was (according to the general feedback received) 1998's Return To Heaven Denied but Freeman really is a killer! I was wondering what Labyrinth would have achieved if they weren't so unlucky in the label part. Hope their current home (Arise Records) will come up with a better understanding of a special attribute, such as...
...them (Labyrinth) being the perfect example of a piece that the track sequence 1...x-1,x,x+1...n does NEVER converge. The show goes on in Freeman: L.Y.A.F.H. (Light Years Away From Home) contradicts a storm-bringing tempo against the velvet vocal melodies of Roberto Tyranti (a.k.a. Rob Tyrant); while twin guitar-led Deserter is a total driver and Dive In Open Waters must be the top-on-speed song for the Labyrinth back-catalogue so far (Angra reminding). Blah, blah, blah... Each song is different from the other, but not - in any way - preventing the band from adapting a personal style. On the contrary: Suspicious elements that could have condemned any other artist/band seem more than proper in the hands of a band that has a non-overwhelming power accompanied by tremendous instrumentation, not to speak about the production...
...which (the production) is an undoubted result of hard work by the band itself. Freeman is obviously a must have for the Labyrinth (and the Labyrinth-clones) fans - won't take no for an answer - but anyone keen on Power (not Teutonic) Metal embellished with Melody to the Power and Intelligence to the Metal...go get the fuckin' CD!
Note: Should I say something mean? The album's cover artwork is - fairly speaking - bad... Please, don't judge from that.