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I was totally unaware that Pain Of Salvation was coming out with a new EP until I was offered the chance to review it. While I would not consider myself a Pain Of Salvation die-hard like some of my friends, I really enjoyed "The Perfect Element Pt. I" quite a bit. That being said, their past couple of albums have kind of sucked, especially the rap-metalesque "Scarsick". I know I was definitely wondering what direction Pain Of Salvatioin would be heading next.

Pain Of Salvation was formed all the way back in 1984, but their first album was not released until 1997. They have since been releasing albums regularly and built up quite a solid (and at times fanatical) fanbase in the process. The first four tracks on this EP are set to appear on a new two-disc studio album some time in the future.

The good news to start off is that this is nothing like "Scarsick"; there’s no rapping, no disco, none of stuff that garnered that album so much criticism. In fact, if one was to compare this to another Pain Of Salvation album, I would say that it is most similar to something that could be found on "Entropia". There is less of a focus on complex arrangements and layered instruments; instead opting for a more straightforward approach. There seems to be a strong influence of 70’s Rock, and not necessarily 70’s prog-rock either.

This is not a bad thing, however. In fact, I’m rather glad that this is the direction that the band is taking. In my opinion, Pain Of Salvation was in danger of collapsing under their own ambition and pretentiousness. They needed to step back and focus on what it was that made them such a great band in the first place, especially after several big lineup changes.

Each of the four songs that are set to appear on the forthcoming album is excellent. If the rest of the album is on the same level as these four songs, we will have an album that will be right up there with "The Perfect Element Pt. 1" and "Remedy Lane". The interview is mostly just the band screwing around, so that is hardly worthwhile. The Scorpions cover that closes the album is nice, but hardly essential.

If you really need a Pain Of Salvation fix, then by all means pick up this EP. However, I would advise against it simply because I believe that these songs that will appear on the forthcoming album will be even stronger when in the context of the album as a whole. This review will hopefully serve as a beacon of hope that disgruntled fans should not give up on this band, at least not yet.

(Originally published at www.metal-temple.com)

I’m beginning to think that Daniel Gildenlow is going out of his way to see how long it takes for all of Pain of Salvation’s fans to stop following the band. After four straight albums of increasingly emotional and technical prog metal the band released what is quite possibly the most ambitious concept album of all time. By trying to sum up all of existence in 70 minutes, “BE” pushed away a large faction of the band’s listeners who longed for a more song oriented release and the long awaited sequel to “The Perfect Element”. Being a giant asshole, Gildenlow gave them both in the form of a rap metal album that sacrificed complexity and subtlety in order to take a simple idea and beat the listener over the head with it for as long as possible.

And now we have this, a small teaser from what is apparently going to be a double album. Once again, Gildenlow is doing his best to piss off the purists; this time by recording straightforward hard rock songs in live takes with very little extra production. In a lot of ways I feel like this EP is a return to the earthier and under produced sound found on “The Perfect Element” and “Remedy Lane” albeit with much less going on in the mix. This is a pretty stark contrast to “Scarsick” which sounding extremely modern, both in production and song writing.

Speaking of which, the song writing here is absolutely stunning. As Gildenlow announced previously, there is a fair amount of 70’s rock influence (see the keyboards in the opening of the title track, the bluesy riffs in “Mortar Grind”, and the Scorpions cover) but this is still Pain of Salvation through and through. There’s still a ton of rhythmic trickery going on, the choruses are enormous and Daniel Gildenlow is still the best and most histrionic singer on the planet. New to his arsenal of vocal skills are the blood curdling screams most prominently featured on “Mortar Grind”. He hinted at this ability on “Flame To A Moth” but here he’s really screaming his balls off. That should put an end to the “all he does is croon” argument.

However Gildenlow is no longer the lone virtuoso in the band. New drummer Leo Margrit, formerly of a bunch of crazy jazz fusion groups and a pretty boring deathcore band, deserves a very warm welcome by PoS fans for his performance here. While I still maintain that Johan Langell was the most underrated drummer in the prog metal scene, Leo takes the playing in this band to a whole new level. Listen to “If you wait” and observe how he’s able to add so many embellishing notes to the groove without throwing off the feel of the song. He’s able to build the entire piece up from scratch with next to no help from the rest of the band, determining when and where the band should get loud, and where they should lay back.

But let’s not kid ourselves, as awesome as the shorter more straightforward songs are, the tune we’re all here for is “Gone”. It’s pretty safe to say that this is the best individual song Pain of Salvation have released since “Remedy Lane”. Not only that, but it’s probably the darkest song they’ve written ever. It takes a lot of skill for a band to write a song responding directly to critics without coming across as whiny and out of touch. Dream Theater did it incorrectly with “Never Enough”, but Pain of Salvation nails it with this one. The song twists and turns in its own skin, never feeling comfortable until it explodes in the chorus. Even then, the cathartic rage is short lived and replaced with the yearning, anxious, and downright unnerving bridge. You get the sense that Gildenlow is trying to hold back his rage, he knows he should try and be diplomatic but in the end the only thing he can do is crank it up and destroy everything in sight.

I’m sure there are going to be a ton of prog metal fans who will no doubt be furious at this change of style, but honestly who cares about them? Pain of Salvation hasn’t comfortably fit in the prog metal world since 1998 and they aren’t looking back now. This band is continuing its journey down its own path, and to them anyone who jumps ship now was just dead weight in the first place.

P.S. “Yellow Raven” is very pretty, and “Bonus Track B” is mildly amusing. Not too much else to say about them.