Metal Underground.com

New Eden wasn't kidding around when they named their sophomore album. "Obscure Master Plan" is one of those albums that takes a few listens to get.

Especially for a power metal release, the riffs seemed awfully sloppy. "The Promise," for example, begins with calm melody, but seems to lurch off in several directions within the space of seconds, with guitarist Horacio Comenares finally returning to melodic form for the shred at the end. It took several listens to figure out that what sounded sloppy was actually quite intricately plotted out. It's the old Led Zeppelin credo of "tight-but-loose" in action.

Colmenares, who used to play in Steel Prophet, and fellow guitarist Oscar Gomez, do their best work on the disc's second track, "Evil Logic," which utilizes the twin-guitar attack well.

I also enjoy the fact that, where much power metal has a sense of lightness about it, New Eden goes for a heavy, almost thrashy approach to the intros of "Demons Of Earth" and "Epitaph," and the subject matter of both is quite a bit darker than your average swords and sorcery power metal fare.

Vocalist Tony Devita has the clean, soaring approach of many power metal singers, but who he really reminds me of is ex-Anthrax singer Joey Belladonna in many ways.

If the band, as it existed in 1999 when this album was recorded (only Colmenares remains now) had one weak link, it was drummer Michael O. Echeveria. Songs like "Epitaph" and "Flicker Of Faith" really suffer from his overly simple approach, which tends to make the songs sound slower than they really are.

On this disc, Colmenares also handled the bass parts, and he's competent enough. The intro to "The Promise" has an interesting bass line that combines with the clean electric guitars well. That said, the bass is mixed a bit low for my taste.

"Obscure Master Plan," as I noted earlier, was originally released in 1999, but is currently in re-release, thanks to Metal Mind Productions, under license from Nuclear Blast. The re-release is limited to 2,000 copies, so if you're interested, you'd probably better grab it up quick.

It took a while to grow on me, but "Obscure Master Plan" won me over — despite its decidedly sub par drumming — with its superb guitar work and vocals.