Jon Oliva's Pain is now my pain

So I finally got around to listening to JOP's latest album "Festival". I came into this hoping it was better then "Global Warming". Not that Global was a bad album it's just that an album preaching to me about the world's woes on every track was aggravating. And the first two JOP albums were fantastic extensions of the Savatage days so I was hoping this would be a return to form.

I guess it is but after reading that Jon is going back over old tapes to mine old riffs from his late brother Criss for each release,listening to this made me think he's starting to scrape the bottom of the barrel. Not to mention his vocals are starting to really sound ragged. It could also be my current malaise with the whole metal scene at the moment too. I might go back and thoroughly enjoy this release.

Basically a mediocre album from Jon Oliva is light years better then some of the garbage I've been hearing lately it's just after listening to most of his projects since "Sirens" I have a certain level of expectation and when it's not met I feel disappointed. If you're new to Jon Oliva definately check out their material, you might enjoy it more then I did. Stand out track for me on this album is "I Fear you". Go to their Myspace page and see what you think.