»13th November 2007

Music Review: Iced Earth 'Framing Armageddon'

Amazingly, the student paper actually bothered to print my Skeletonwitch review in this weeks Leeds Student, so I'm going to continue my assault on the music section with the raw power of METAL with this review of Iced Earth. Even more shocking was the fact that my review was right at the top of the music section, WITH a picture and described as the 'album of the week' which made me aglow with evil pride when I picked up a copy of the paper in the Parkinson yesterday. I wouldn't be too surprised if this review doesn't get printed, certainly not the album of the week, that's if the music section really doesn't have that many submissions anyway.
Enough of my babble, you want to read the review, right?

Iced Earth – Framing Armageddon (Something Wicked Part 1) (Steamhammer/SPV)

‘Framing Armageddon’ is the ninth studio album by Jon Schaffer’s thrash/power metal outfit Iced Earth and has so far spawned one single ‘Ten Thousand Strong’. With another new line-up, Iced Earth have served up another meaty slice of power metal for us all to consume. As with all power metal bands, Iced Earth’s goal was clearly to be ‘epic’ and being ‘epic’ is something they’ve honed to a fine art after since their debut album in 1990. ‘Framing Armageddon’ is a sort of follow-up to the ‘Something Wicked’ trilogy of songs from the 1998 album ‘Something Wicked This Way Comes’.
We’ve all been there, you’re an ancient omniscient race calling yourself the Setians who are all but wiped out by the invading humans from outer space 10,000 years ago. You’ve guessed it, ‘Framing Armageddon’ is a wacky concept album and bears more than a passing resemblance to the ideas put forward by everyone’s favourite cult/legitimate religion, Scientology. Fortunately, Jon Schaffer hasn’t announced any plans to make his own religion yet and the story of the Setians will remain a bizarre album concept and no more.

Yet more cool album artwork from the Iced Earth guys

The sound of the album is in traditional Iced Earth territory. Schaffer lays down a gallop-rhythm foundation for Tim Owen’s vocals to soar over. There are the obligatory righteous instrumental sections, and texture and atmosphere are brought to the fore with quieter sections such as the opening track ‘Overture’. That’s right, this album is so big it needs an overture. This contrast in sounds helps give the album a more cinematic feel which is just what the story demands. There are a whopping nineteen songs on the album but amongst these are several short atmospheric tracks, such as ‘Cataclysm’ which evoke a sci-fi soundscape feel with layered sound effects and keyboards. ‘The Clouding’ is a nine minute epic, starting off with soothing acoustic guitars building through a powerful mid-section to a crescendo of grand power metal proportions.
The album’s faintly ridiculous sci-fi story actually helps to sustain your interest across the hour and ten minutes running time. ‘Framing Armageddon’ won’t win Iced Earth many new fans with the band maintaining their trademark sound, but it is easily their best work since 1998’s ‘Something Wicked This Way Comes’ with Tim ‘Ripper’ Owen’s vocals a particular highlight. Iced Earth are currently on tour in the UK with Lamb of God and Heaven and Hell.

7/10
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This review continued the trend of having an even more arbitrary score out of ten. For some reason they didn't include the score I gave to the Skeletonwitch album which is fine by me as it's pretty meaningless anyway.
More of these will follow.


Extar, over, out.

79. If someone is especialy brutal say "HAIL MOTHERFUCKER"