Icarus Witch

(Magick)
by Martin Popoff

Following up on their more than well-received debut EP, traditional archivists Icarus Witch bring back the best guitar tone in rock for a record that bravely doesn’t stand up and wave its arms wildly about the band’s many strengths. In fact, Capture The Magic envelopes the listener in lush progressive metal, mid-paced and even panoramically languished grooves. Thinking man’s Primal Fear, double bass-void Stratovarius (Kotipelto solo?), or the last couple of Maidens come to mind, Icarus Witch creating a landscape of dependable, frilly-sleeved metal that captures the ennui of the underrated Mercyful Fate reunion albums up to but not including 9. Vocalist Matt Bizilia has a uniquely twangy, cannily over-the-top voice that puts the band outside of power metal categories, despite the earthy, Force of Evil-styled twin leads. The sum total of these tracks captures an earlier time in metal through open architectures, trudging rhythms, and a merciless moroseness. And finally, there’s an unadorned and swinging cover of Ozzy’s “S.A.T.O.,” the band’s treatment serving as metaphor for the mood of the album: It’s actually more laid-back than the original. One applauds the fact that this album doesn’t blaze brightly (an intriguingly warm, rounded-off fidelity aids in the achievement of this), but one also wonders if the more impatient among the power metal set will find it too uniformly unshowy.
(www.cleorecs.com)