The debut album from this new band from Texas makes a huge impression of maturity at the first listen. They play a very intricate and complex, but rather light sounding prog metal which defies definitions. First, the musicianship of all the band members is outstanding. Second, the production is excellent. Third, the music is dominated by the extraordinary complex rhythms, tempo changes, and totally crazy drumming. Taken individually, I will describe each musician to try to encompass this original style of prog metal: the singer is a real Geoff Tate clone; his voice really sounds like him, it's not imitation ! The drummer has a very light "jazzy" touch, and his cymbal playing is so weird that it is sometimes difficult to understand. The same complexity can be said about the bass player. The guitar player is in my opinion he main "weakness", which actually imparts the overall effect of the music. He never plays any riffs, what gives the compositions an impression of fuzziness, and lack of backbone and consistency. All tracks are built without any graspable structure to hold to. The result is indeed a brilliant album, but which will probably fail to catch the SX-fan.

This debut album from Power of Omens has to be one of the most technical albums ever in the Progressive Metal genre. The music is very extremely intricate and complex. They are stretching the boundaries of progressive metal to its outer limits. Power Of Omens influences are Queensryche, Dream Theater, Iron Maiden, Shadow Gallery, Fates Warning and Rush, and you can hear it very clearly in their music. The powerful singer Chris Salinas is almost a copy of Queensr˙che's Geoff Tate. Actually it's hard to tell the difference. The musicians are outstanding (the fact that such brilliant musicians found each other is amazing), and Power of Omens are one of the best new Prog Metal bands from USA.

Sometimes it's almost too much going on, with thousands of beats at once, and constantly changing time signatures, making the music very inaccessible. The only things that are missing here are some memorable choruses. This is what separates them from, for example Dream Theater. Dream Theater is among the best Prog Metal musicians today, but they also got the ability to write memorable songs. Power Of Omens should have thought more about that instead of just trying to get it as complex as possible. But after all you could say that this is Power of Omens trademark. To make music for those who like technical skills above all. And you can't find a more appropriate band if that's the case, but they sure wont make any big money on their music. But after all, money isn't everything!

The songs range from 5 to 20 minutes. It isn't easy to pick out any highlights on a record like this, so I wont. But I have to mention "Test of Wills", which is a 19:55 minute masterpiece that have to be one of the best Prog Metal tunes ever written. It's divided into four pieces, and I love the Spanish guitar on part II "A Struggle Within".

Power of Omens brilliant progressive music will surely find it's way to the heart of every fan of high technical progressive metal. This must be the best debut album in 1998 and one of the best Prog Metal releases ever. What you have here is a masterpiece and a milestone in progressive metal. Highly recommended!

Rumors are saying that they have another album in the making, and it's gonna be different compared to "Eyes Of The Oracle". I think that if the new album have got some more hooks, that album will be their breakthrough. No doubt about it! A record to look forward to.