Poetry for the Poisoned

Ghost Opera is only a decent album. I has several songs that absolutely require the skip button, though it's saved by having three of my favorite power metal songs ever on it. Ghost Opera, Rule the World and Eden echo are great songs. This album has one maybe two even remotely decent songs (more on that later). It's sad when a band as good as Kamelot whom released one of the greatest power metal albums of all time (The Black Halo), can release something so incredibly boring and bland as this. I hate how Roy Khan, one of the greatest power metal vocalists of all time just managed to be so incredibly boring on this album. He barely goes for any high notes and he pretty much stays in that mid range singing some really, really bland chorus's.


Where to begin... Well I suppose I'll start off with the high points (of which there are not very many). The Great Pandemonium and Necropolis are the only songs I actually enjoyed from this. You might notice that these are the only songs from this album they play live. These two are only mildly entertaining and there is enough good Kamelot material where these would be the last songs I would pick out of the good ones. Seriously, The Great Pandemonium is the only, and I mean ONLY memorable song on this; it's got a decent chorus though by Kamelot standards very average. Necropolis isn't really that memorable, but if you take the time to listen to it it's not half bad. It's one of those slow but epic songs that no power metal album is complete without. The rest of this is barely even listenable. The Zodiac had promise, but ruined it with the awful guest voice trying to be shagrath and failing badly. The rest of this is very unmemorable and just boring. There are almost no fast songs on this except Once Upon a Time and parts three and four of Poetry for the Poisoned. Once Upon a Time has such an INCREDIBLY generic chorus it would be laughable if it weren't so sad. With Poetry for the Poisoned they were clearly going for something similar to Elizabeth, but it epically failed; mainly because again, Roy Khan refuses to go high at all. Also The individual parts are so short and the the longest one is a ballad (of which there are already enough of in this album). Part 4 could actually have been a redeeming part of this album, but because it's so short and unmemorable I'm not giving any points out for it.

Kamelot's ship has sailed, they were once a great power metal band with four REALLY good albums in a row and one decent one with a couple of classics ending the streak. This one has made it quite clear that Thomas Youngblood has lost his creative touch and I think that the rest of the band needs to step in and help write their future albums more. It might be a little sad that Roy Khan left the band, but personally I think the sound they had with him is done. They got some great material out of their time with him as lead singer, but it's clear that Thomas has no idea what to do with his voice anymore.

This album was way over hyped as well as misrepresented by using The Great Pandemonium as the live song to play before the album's release. I really hope that Kamelot can get back on their feet with a new singer and really write some new and different stuff because I was kind of getting tired of their sound that they've been using since the 4th legacy. This is definitely their worst album to date and not only shouldn't be bought, it shouldn't even be looked at. It should be buried under several layers of rock and cement, never to see the light of day again.