Art X
The Redemption of Cain

“You want to know my story - it’s a bitter one, be advised – there’s neither pride nor glory – it’s a long and bleak demise.” At first I thought he was going to tell my story but as it happens it was the story of Cain, you know that guy who happened to murder 25% of the Earth population – if you are to believe The Bible. That book as some serious flaws though, especially in the stories of how it all begun – where did Cain find his wife and wasn’t she even worth a name? And who wed them? It is not like there was an abundance of priests at that time, yeah that story is flawed and this one told by an Italian guy named Gabriele Bernasconi makes a lot more sense.

It is a story told in metal/rock opera form where Bernasconi has enlisted the help of several well-known vocalists like Zak Stevens and Blaze Bayley to name just a pair of them. Melodic and progressive is how you can describe this album, relatively varied and like the story in the Bible it is short but a whole lot more to the point than the story in the Bible that really doesn’t make any sense. The album has a strong production, good sound with strong vocalists – I think he has found a strong cast for this story.

And this strong cast have created a fairly strong story but it lacks a strong punch line, something to make you really take to the album. I think it sort of falls away towards the end, perhaps like the story of Cain does in the saga called Genesis. As you may have deduced from my godlike ramblings, it isn’t the best one of the year and chances are that it will be forgotten pretty quickly but that doesn’t mean that it isn’t completely without merit. I kind of like it, I think the story is pretty interesting but maybe it could have used more depth.

The thing with Bible stories is that you have to add lots of depth for them to have any kind of literary quality and I just think Bernasconi should have done more with this story. But the first words with which I open this review are good as is the song that follows them, I also think that the fourth track is strong as well but the songs towards the end isn’t as good. I think the story of Cain works well as a rock opera, could be fun to check out but don’t expect a miracle of biblical proportions.

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