Nocturnal Rites - The Sacred Talisman (1999)^{Release ID: 12623}

I heard the first two Nocturnal Rites albums before heading to this, and I gotta say I'm not very impressed.  Their early music is incredibly standard power metal.  Thankfully, they show some improvement on their third album.  The opener, "Destiny Calls," may be another standard, but the heaviness is improved upon, making its anthemic tone more fulfilling and easy to jam with.  "The Iron Force" is slower in tone and a little less heavy, but more melodically focused, and the solo makes the best part of the song.  It's probably the best solo the band had done at that point.  The album goes right back to the speed on "Ride On," and keeps the speed up with their greatest focus on the medieval atmos with "Free at Last," which is the heaviest Nocturnal Rites song thus far (not counting the death metal demos).  Not only are the vocals beautifully handled, but the incredible solo and atmosphere make this an incredible song.  Nocturnal Rites, as far as I'm concerned, finally made a great, if not perfect song.  Unfortunately, "Hold On to the Flame" felt typical as soon as it started.  Sure, the energy is there, but that opening riff is still kinda generic.  At least the heavy focus on melody gives its presence some oomph.

"Eternity Holds" is next, and it steers much closer to classic heavy metal, relying on the guitar tone.  Unfortunately, the sense of rhythm suffers under the focus, so it feels like a filler song.  "When Fire Comes to Ice" is different, though.  It keeps the speed and energy of classic metal while focusign on both rhythm and badassery evenly, and it never once feels like filler.  At this point it was the second best song on the album.  "The Legend Lives On" is a ballad, one heavily driven by piano, and while it's a pretty enough song to go on a power metal album, it begs the question, why wasn't one of these on side A?  It would feel less out of place if there was one on side A.  "King's Command" goes right back to the anthemic power metal, and the vibe is quite empowering, but again it is a standard song.  "Unholy Powers" continues that vibe with a similar tempo, but a higher focus on speed metal roots as far as the guitars are concerned.  The song kinda jams.  Finally, we have "Glorious" as the finale, and once again it just slightly improves on the tempo's speed and general heaviness, meaning the whole fourth quarter of the album is essentially three of the same song with slight differences.  But since it's a bit faster and heavier, it makes for a good ending.

Honestly, Nocturnal Rites seem to have a problem with the concept of creativity.  It's something that they seem to only slowly grasp with every album they release.  Thankfully, they worked much harder on the standars of poiwer metal and trying a little harder to make a name for themselves.  One of the songs, "Free At Last," was absolutely stunning, especially for their prowess.  But other than that, it's a slight improvement on two decent albums.