Iced Earth

Horror Show

Iced Earth keeps carrying the torch

Review Score:

(8/10)
To start off with, Horror Show is a truly great metal album. With that said, I think the casual metal fan will take a while to warm up to Horror Show because it is a concept album. If you're already an Iced Earth fan and you've read the interviews on the website and listen to the 2nd CD, you'll know ahead of time what to expect and the whole CD will become more accessible.

When I first listened to Horror Show, I thought the engineering sounded a lot different from past IE discs. It didn't turn me off or anything, it just struck me as different. Musically, every track is classic Iced Earth. What that means is driving rythm guitar like no other band I know of coupled with Barlow's timeless vocals (Barlow had to be put on earth specifically to be IE's lead singer). All the songs are full of pure driving energy (with a little drop-off with the Creature from the Black Lagoon song, "Dragon's Child"). "Jack" and "Phantom Opera Ghost" are two instant classics, imho.

I think if you look at the progression from Maiden's "Phantom of the Opera" to Iced Earth's "Phantom Opera Ghost", you realize that IE is one of the main bands keeping metal alive as an art.

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