- Waiting For The King review
| Band: | Hercules |
| Album: | Waiting For The King |
| Style: | Epic heavy metal |
| Release date: | April 2023 |
01. Waiting For The King II
02. Warlords Of The Sun Part I
03. Interlude
04. Warlords Of The Sun Part II
05. Masked Pirate
06. Golden Path
07. Dream Of The Golden Path
08. Warlords Of The Sun Part II [instrumental version]
09. The Past Flies Away
Hercules is a Greek traditional heavy metal one-man project masterminded by Chris Andreadakis. After a lively, full-blooded outing in 2022, Legend Of Metal, Andreadakis has opted for a curious change in musical approach on follow-up record Waiting For The King.
I’ll admit that my eye was drawn towards Waiting For The King due to its artwork; after several conventional album covers for Hercules’ first few albums, Andreadakis opted for what appears to be a tribute to Yngwie Malmsteen’s Trilogy with the cover of Legend Of Metal, and has similarly selected a Photoshop-esque cover for Waiting For The King. It’s often said that great artwork is a good indicator of a great album; in contrast, unpolished artwork is more often an indicator of limited resources, which is a common challenge for solo projects, and one that is unfair to hold against them. It might be harsh to raise other limitations of an album from such a project, but given that the only reviews I can currently find for Hercules albums are a series of Metal-Archives reviews containing surprisingly specific details and written similarly to posts on the band’s social media, perhaps a contrasting perspective is not unwarranted.
So, what change in approach has there been? Well, Legend Of Metal was a generally high-tempo, high-volume, high-energy classic metal affair, one that at times spilled over into speed metal territory; none of this particularly applies to Waiting For The King. To give a sense of the contrasting approaches, Waiting For The King has almost half the number of tracks as Legend Of Metal but is only a few minutes shorter (although it should be noted that one of these tracks is an instrumental version of another one already on the record, “Warlords Of The Sun Part II”, which is generously available for free download on Bandcamp). Andreadakis has opted for long songs here; he’s also opted for slower and quieter songs, to a quite peculiar extent.
The opening track “Waiting For The King II” (although I can’t find a “Waiting For The King I” in their discography) is the shortest conventional song on the album, and is probably the liveliest song here (bar maybe “Masked Pirate”), but even it has a doominess to its chorus refrain. It also has a medieval vibe to its central guitar melodies, in keeping with the theme of the album artwork. This historical fantasy feel to the melodies persists in subsequent songs, such as a nice lead guitar melody in “Warlords Of The Sun Part II”; what doesn’t persist is a consistent presence of distorted guitars. The riffs, which already were more muted on the opening song than they were on Legend Of Metal, disappear for significant portions of the rest of the album, and lie somewhat buried in the mix even when present. Instead, Hercules opts for clean guitar balladry, and sometimes riffing, as a primary tool across Waiting For The King, with the volume coming most frequently from the guitar solos that appear often across the album.
It's an unusual approach, to be honest, and not one that I think really suits Hercules. There was something of a DIY roughness to the production and writing on Legend Of Metal, but the energy of the album compensated for it. Here, the muted sound highlights some issues more markedly, most notably the programmed drums. Andreadakis has expressed dissatisfaction at people questioning the drums on the album, describing such comments as “anti-metal and pathetic”; however, even though I appreciate that having a solo project and lacking the ability to play drums is a major hurdle that’s difficult to navigate, there is still talent to programming drums, and percussion here is rudimentary at best, something that is amplified by the drum package used, which results in cymbal rolls with a single tone constantly repeated in a detractingly unnatural fashion. Even beyond this point, however, there are serious issues with Waiting For The King.
There are four songs on the album that are 7 minutes or longer, which is longer than any one song on Legend of Metal; when scaling up songwriting, one has to ask the question of whether each section in a song justifies its presence. Andreadakis clearly has skill as a guitarist, and the solos on this album are typically the strongest feature of each song (with one glaring exception). Outside of the solos, however, I struggle to find much to connect with on these songs. “Warlords Of The Sun Part I” flickers back and forth between heavier material with marching snares and quiet clean guitar passages; I’m not taken with either, but I feel the alternating between them gives an overall awkward feel to the song. “Warlords Of The Sun Part II” opts for a soft start that gradually builds to a louder finish, but the minstrel-style first half runs for too long and is overly punctuated with excessive guitar soloing, and in the second half, despite the song shifting into a more potent march, the distorted guitar chugs that one would expect to enhance the force of the rhythm are either absent or so buried in the mix as to be inaudible, underselling the impact of the actually quite nice clean guitar motif that is repeated in this passage.
Andreadakis has quite a wide range of vocal approaches used on this album, covering loud higher-pitched singing, a lower-register tone, and softer singing right through to full-blooded metal shrieks. All of these style can be heard on the album’s longest song, “Golden Path”; while he has some ability with the more voluminous singing, his attempts at a soft voice really do not work. Conversely, vocals are not heard at all on “Dream Of The Golden Path”, and this is the track in which the ‘one glaring exception’ lurks. “Dream Of The Golden Path” is a 10-minute instrumental featuring no percussion, instead having a constant guitar solo over a single clean guitar riffing backdrop. The track is frankly borderline unlistenable; Hercules have claimed their dislike of all famous guitar players, but they could really stand to learn something about phrasing from some of those musicians, as the soloing on this track is erratic and frequently amusical. There is also no clear relationship between the soloing guitar and the background guitar, both seemingly operating with neither internal cohesion nor any connection with one another. I can’t claim to enjoy Waiting For The King as a whole, but the inclusion of this track pretty much single-handedly knocks a point off the score.
Waiting For The King differs drastically from any other Hercules album, even The Triumph Of True Metal and its three 15-minute songs; such substantial shifts in approach typically represent a musician exploring a long-term passion, but if that is the case, it’s either not been executed in the way it was intended, or it’s not a passion that has long-term prospects. Andreadakis has a pretty extreme perception of Hercules and its output, referring to their first 3 albums as ’among the most important albums in the wave of new true heavy metal’, and The Triumph Of True Metal as the best epic metal album in the Hellenic scene; I do not hold Hercules’ albums prior to Waiting For The King as being remotely of this standard, but even compared to what Hercules have released before, Waiting For The King is a misstep.
Rating breakdown
| Performance: | 5 |
| Songwriting: | 4 |
| Originality: | 5 |
| Production: | 4 |
Rating:
9.8
9.8
|
Rating: 9.8 |
Chris Hercules - the one-man band passionate metalhead - can't stop producing original epic metal masterpieces. The amount of ideas and momentary epic riffs in such a small time frame is so unbelievably vast. This guy seems to have received such a huge gift from the Muses. His inspired music flows endlessly like the water of the spring of Helicon. Read more ›› |
Comments
- 1
- 2
Comments: 33
Visited by: 143 users
| Nejde Moderator Posts: 1592  |
This review is way to nice. Linking his comments from Facebook is hilarious though. I'm always trying to avoid writing negative comments but this album is pure tripe and your score is too high imo. I think it would be easier to sit through 20 minutes of Lulu than 20 minutes of this. But at the same time there's always something funny about musicians with delusions of grandeur. This album is a 2 at best and I wish I could unhear it. Kudos for listening to the whole thing, must've been one hell of an ordeal.
Loading...
|
| Boxcar Willy yr a kook Posts: 9040  |
No way an album with that cover sucks.
Loading...
|
| ScreamingSteelUS Editor-in-Chief Admin Posts: 5747  |
This is one of the most insufferable bands on the planet and I applaud your painstaking loyalty to professional courtesy. The sheer unvarnished ego of those Facebook posts makes that Yngwie Malmsteen comparison vital for nonmusical reasons. If I had a nickel for every Hellenic epic metal band that Hercules does not manage to surpass, I'd have some very loud pockets. Nobody tell Firewind, Spitfire, Sacred Outcry, Warrior Path, Orion's Reign, Steel Arctus, Stygian Oath, Sacral Rage, Jaded Star, Black Fate, InnerWish, or Sunburst that they've been outclassed. It's not even that the music is so terrible - I mean, a 4/10 seems fair, as this album sounds downright goofy at times. The sound effects are terrible, the vocals are extremely variable in quality, and the obviously canned everything grates after a while. I think you've already said everything that needs to be said about the role of the guitar on this album, although I will say that I was dreadfully confused by "Dream Of The Golden Path" and waited the entire ten minutes for it to start making sense. But the ghostly keys, the (better-performed) vocals, and the terrible production do give me some old-school, lo-fi epic metal vibes a la Warlord, Lordian Guard, Manilla Road, etc., and that's cool. The vibe isn't half-bad and some of the riffs and melodies are catchy. It's the presentation that's the biggest thorn in Hercules's side. If the guy could move this past the bedroom stage, there could really be something to this. I get the sense, however, that learning to accept criticism and putting in the work to improve are not really on the menu.
---- "Earth is small and I hate it" - Lum Invader I'm the Agent of Steel.
Loading...
|
| Netzach Planewalker Staff Posts: 1644  |
Loading...
|
| corrupt With a lowercase c Admin Posts: 3286  |
Written by MetalTrobadour on 03.06.2023 at 20:02 Dude. We know this is you. You are this band. I applaud your self-esteem but what are you trying to achieve here? 
---- 
Loading...
|
| Nejde Moderator Posts: 1592 |
Written by MetalTrobadour on 03.06.2023 at 20:02 If this album is a masterpiece, then I'm the queen of Sweden.
Loading...
|
| Redel Moderator Posts: 2108  |
Written by [user id=335528] on 04.06.2023 at 05:20 Please, only speak English on Metal Storm, thank you.
Loading...
|
| AndyMetalFreak A Nice Guy Contributor Posts: 4925  |
Yes the production is very amateur ish (no offence intended), and the vocals and sound effects are corny as hell, but some of the instrumentation and synth work is actually not bad, it's at least catchy for the most part. What really let's it down for me isn't necessarily the songwriting, but the way in which it's presented, and if you present an album in this manner, then you should expect harsh criticism! Well, the album does bring a beaming smile to my face throughout, so I suppose it's not totally dreadful, actually, it's hilarious fun indeed, that is, if treated as a parody instead of a serious epic heavy metal album. (again, no offence intended).
---- http://Andy's 2024 album ranking
Loading...
|
| Nejde Moderator Posts: 1592 |
Written by [user id=335528] on 04.06.2023 at 05:20 Translation: 'Very unfair review. The record has an atmospheric aura and does have slower tempos. But this does not reduce him in any way' Guess MetalTrobadour got either one of his friends to make an account too or made another one himself, just to come here and rate it a 10, since this account was created today. And as Redel pointed out, use English only (so everyone else can get a laugh too)
Loading...
|
| Nejde Moderator Posts: 1592 |
Written by MetalTrobadour on 05.06.2023 at 04:02 I like some epic metal too but this album is not it.
Loading...
|
| JoHn Doe Posts: 4974  |
I could not listen to more than a couple of minutes. Godawful stuff. 
---- I thought the two primary purposes for the internet were cat memes and overreactions.
Loading...
|
| AndyMetalFreak A Nice Guy Contributor Posts: 4925 |
Written by MetalTrobadour on 04.06.2023 at 21:51 I can understand the intent to create something truly epic here, and TBF it does have it's occasional moments (although not many I unfortunately must add), but for me the sound quality is of sub-par standards. That normally wouldn't pose a real issue for me, however, the songwriting here isn't all that great tbh. This particular vocaI style, I personally, find hard to take seriously (no offence), the idea of adding sound effects (in theory), is an interesting one, but somehow, the sound effects, along with the vocals, have a certain awkwardness about them. Greece is brimming with top quality epic heavy metal bands atm, and you could argue the nation is leading the the way in that particular scene, but Hercules seem to be a long way off some of the standards of those bands IMHO.
---- http://Andy's 2024 album ranking
Loading...
|
| Nejde Moderator Posts: 1592 |
Written by AndyMetalFreak on 05.06.2023 at 09:17 You're way too diplomatic Andy. This is the guy behind the band trolling the comments section trying to convince everyone else that his album is a true masterpiece of epic heavy metal. It's not, it's pure garbage. There, I said it. There's also three other accounts created during the weekend that is rate boosting the album and the rest of the discography, trying to make people into thinking that these are some masterpieces. They're not. Luckily people aren't that stupid though.
Loading...
|
| AndyMetalFreak A Nice Guy Contributor Posts: 4925 |
Written by Nejde on 05.06.2023 at 10:32 I tried to give him the benefit of the doubt, but now after discovering the many accounts recently created to tactically boost the albums rating, I can only take that back. This is a bad album where the negatives clearly outweigh the very few positives, and the overall rating, without the recent accounts taken into consideration, is clearly justified.
---- http://Andy's 2024 album ranking
Loading...
|
| Cynic Metalhead Paisa Vich Nasha Posts: 6972  |
Did we get one of the nomination for drama of the year...award?
Loading...
|
| Boxcar Willy yr a kook Posts: 9040 |
Loading...
|
| AndyMetalFreak A Nice Guy Contributor Posts: 4925 |
This reminds me of the scenario we had earlier on in the year with Najand - Battle For Emancipation. Only that album had an even worse reception than this.
---- http://Andy's 2024 album ranking
Loading...
|
| Nejde Moderator Posts: 1592 |
Written by Hercules(GR) on 05.06.2023 at 15:10 Yes, there is. Making accounts just to rate boost a specific album or discography goes against the rules of rating. You can read them here, and to clarify it here in the thread: 'Please give realistic ratings: your vote should reflect your genuine opinion of the album's quality and it should not take into account the votes of other users, the current average score of the album, where the album sits on the charts, or any other irrelevant information. Voting just to manipulate an album's position, be that positively or negatively, is one of the definitions of rating abuse.'
Loading...
|
| Karlabos Meat and Potatos Posts: 5658  |
Wow ppl seem to be shitting on this a lot. which means it's probably good 
---- "Aah! The cat turned into a cat!" - Reimu Hakurei
Loading...
|
| musclassia Staff Posts: 7194  |
Written by Karlabos on 05.06.2023 at 17:59 Give it a go then - the two groups of opinions in this thread linger at the extremes of the positive/negative spectrum, so you may love it
Loading...
|
| Ioannis91 Account deleted |
|
| Nejde Moderator Posts: 1592 |
Written by [user id=335528] on 05.06.2023 at 18:52 Creating an account just to rate two albums (which aren't even good) a 10 to boost their score is considered rating abuse and goes against our rules. You're right, you don't need permission but you have to follow the rules which everyone on Metal Storm, both new and old members, have to do.
Loading...
|
| Redel Moderator Posts: 2108 |
Written by Hercules(GR) on 05.06.2023 at 20:28 I disagree. Judging something you dislike is even a skill I would say. Because it forces you to pinpoint the exact reasons why you dislike it in the first place. Merely saying that something 'is just not your thing' is easy. But thinking about and expressing what the exact reasons are why you dislike it, checking over and over again if the reasons can really stand criticsm, that is what I would call an elaborate assessment.
Loading...
|
| Nejde Moderator Posts: 1592 |
Written by Hercules(GR) on 05.06.2023 at 20:28 There's a very big difference between not liking a band's music and music that is actually bad. I'm sorry, but from what I managed to listen to before I had to turn it off was not bad (a 4) nor a 3 (very bad), therefore I rated it a 2 which is considered 'pure shit' according to our rating system. "Dreams Of The Golden Path" is probably one of the worst songs I've ever heard, if not the worst. I couldn't stand more than 20 seconds before my ears hurt from that abominable cacophony. There's no redeeming qualities to your album in my opinion. It is that bad. Also there's no reason for me to elaborate more than what I wrote in the very first comment in this thread because the review already says it all. The difference is that I don't have to show professional courtesy. So whether you like it or not is none of my concern. And instead of taking the criticism to heart you spout delusional comments thinking your album is a masterpiece and that you're the king of Greek heavy metal (yeah, I read those comments on Facebook before you deleted them). And trying to balance the rating by either creating multiple accounts or have your friends create accounts to rate 10s is considered rating abuse. It's clearly stated in our rules of rating albums: Voting just to manipulate an album's position, be that positively or negatively, is one of the definitions of rating abuse. So we can play a game if you want. You and your (supposed) friends can keep rating the albums with 10s and I can keep deleting them. How does that sound?
Loading...
|
| Karlabos Meat and Potatos Posts: 5658 |
Written by musclassia on 05.06.2023 at 18:03 Heard some bits here and there. It's.... Not my cup of tea. I can see why this is getting so many mixed opinions, tho. It's definitely not your average epic heavy metal release. Kinda reminds me of Fadades or something.
---- "Aah! The cat turned into a cat!" - Reimu Hakurei
Loading...
|
| Redel Moderator Posts: 2108 |
Written by Hercules(GR) on 06.06.2023 at 06:58 I absolutely see that it may seem unfair to you now that Nejde, who dislikes your album, has decided to delete a couple of 10 ratings on it while leaving all votes below 6 untouched. But I can assure you, that is really just a coincidence. Nejde did not intend to delete all high ratings on your album because he dislikes the album. He deleted votes from accounts that have only been opened up recently, and related to which is has been stated earlier in this thread that "a 10/10 is a good way to balance the rating". So, Nejde has just done his job as a moderator and community manager here and saw to that our rules of voting be followed. In our rules of album ratings it is stated that your ratings should "not take into account the votes of other users, the current average score of the album". That is the prime reason why these votes had to be deleted. I really hope you dont feel put down by this personally, because that is sincerely the least we intend to do.
Loading...
|
| Nejde Moderator Posts: 1592 |
Written by Hercules(GR) on 06.06.2023 at 06:58 I don't hate the band or the music. I just think the music is terrible. When someone has a way bigger ego than actual talent, spouting nonsense like in those deleted Facebook posts of yours, I will call out their bullshit. And when have we denied a good review? Good albums get good ratings from our users, bad albums don't. So when we discover that users are trying to boost the ratings by handing out 10s, which go against our rules, we delete them and we do the same when bands and albums are being tanked by being given 1s just to try lowering the score. Written by Hercules(GR) on 06.06.2023 at 06:58 And what the hell does this even mean? My new wave of true heavy metal? What the hell is Hollywood production? Where talking about music on this site, not movies. The music was absent? This is just nonsensical. Exactly every other band within this genre that I've ever heard have more memorable and catchy riffs than Hercules. And please, do yourself a favor and don't try to compare yourself to Michael Kiske and Andi Deris. Written by Hercules(GR) on 06.06.2023 at 07:25 This is you're best comment thus far and it's hilarious because the thing you're saying here can be interpreted as that there is no real interest, passion and free time but there is boredom. And with your ego you would be impossible to work with and I guess that, plus your lack of real talent, is the reason that Hercules is a one man project.
Loading...
|
| Hercules(GR) Posts: 1 |
|
| Nejde Moderator Posts: 1592 |
Written by Hercules(GR) on 06.06.2023 at 10:54 How are we not allowing good comments? I haven't deleted your comments raising your own music to the skies, which frankly is quite narcissistic. And (thankfully) I haven't listened to the other albums so I'm in no position to rate them. Written by Hercules(GR) on 06.06.2023 at 10:54 This is kinda funny because the only Hercules album that pops up when searching on YouTube is the re-recorded version of Victory that NWOTHM posted 4 years ago. I skimmed through it and it's actually not as bad as Waiting For The King but that doesn't say much because it's still pretty horrible. It's more of a 3-3,5 I would say. And I guess NWOTHM expect some sort of quality regarding what to publish on their channel so obviously they think Waiting For The King sucks too since it isn't featured there. Written by Hercules(GR) on 06.06.2023 at 10:54 That's a delusional comment and you're just ridiculing yourself. Written by Hercules(GR) on 06.06.2023 at 10:54 I don't even understand this question. What that I wrote is this a response to and what are you censoring with "**** **"?
Loading...
|
| RaduP CertifiedHipster Staff Posts: 8743  |
Written by Hercules(GR) on 06.06.2023 at 12:53 Hey Chris, what do you think about the movie where Dwayne Johnson plays Hercules?
---- Do you think if the heart keeps on shrinking One day there will be no heart at all?
Loading...
|
- 1
- 2
Hits total: 2331 | This month: 24