Cheap Age of Mastery (Music) (Jag Panzer) Price

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Customer Reviews of Age of Mastery

Based on the strength of those two CDs, I ordered the rest of their catalog.

Age of Mastery arrived the other day...and it's been in my CD player almost non-stop since. This is incredible music, folks. Well played. Well sung. Well arranged. The guitar solos are a shred-fest. I can't believe I hadn't heard of these guys until about two weeks ago. Now I'm dying to see them in concert.

Age of Mastery is Jag Panzer's fifth CD. I think it is, anyway. I believe they started with a CD called Ample Destruction in 1984 (reissued in 1991). Then Tyrants also released in 1991. Then Dissidant Alliance in 1994. Then The Fourth Judgement in 1997. Then Age of Mastery in 1998. Then Thane to the Throne (2000) and Mechanized Warfare (2001). Please don't hold me to that chronology. But I think that's close to the way it goes. (Tyrants and Ample Destruction are out of print, to my knowledge.)

The Age of Mastery begins with a bang -- lots of guitar soloing. LOTS of guitar soloing. Lots. "Iron Eagle" is the first track and it's a massive song with blazing solos and a big, big rhythm guitar sound. "Lustfull and Free" is the second track, and it too is a huge song. Great air guitar riffing. And vocals that soar way above the music. An almost Judas Priest sound to this track. Great sing-along chorus.

The rest of the CD follows suit, with great guitar-heavy tracks that are more catchy than they are pulverizing, which is the way I like them. Guitars that are too loud or played too fast lose all enjoyment to me. Jag Panzer is the perfect balance between '80s metal melodies and 2002's production standards.

For example, "False Messiah," (track five) is a killer song with an '80s metal feel to it. (Very nice riff.) But it's still got that in-your-face production that's so common these days.

The title track (track 6) is an upbeat song with an melodic, driving intro and fantastic background vocals. Way cool.

If you like your riffs hard, yet melodic, your vocals powerful but clean and your solos plentiful and fast...Jag Panzer's The Age of Mastery is the CD for you.

More like 3 1/2; Very good but missing something
I was torn how to rate this album at first, swaying back and forth between three and four stars. You can see I chose the four, but I'm still pretty much in the middle. There's a reason for that, and it's because the album is very hit or miss. For example, songs like "Iron Eagle" (great opener), "Sworn to Silence," "Chain of Command" (best of the disc), and "The Moors" are very good. Not much on the original side of the fence, but good, straight ahead power metal in the Maiden vein.

However, absolute DUDS like the uber-ballad "Take This Pain Away" made me want to drink bleach. And some of the other songs don't have much for me to remember them by, other than a fleeting thought that it was pretty good, but unsure what it actually sounded like. I will say this however, some of the guitarwork is astounding, as should be expected from this genre of metal, and most (except that damn ballad) of Harry Conklin's vocal stylings are excellent. He's extremely varied in his approach, sometimes pulling off the super high notes a la Dickinson, sometimes nailing classic American power vocals a la Paul Stanley, and sometimes becoming an adequate carbon copy of Hansi. All in all, he's good.

The album is good enough to own, especially if you're a big fan of the genre (you know who you are). If not, I wouldn't recommend starting here. For example, I'm a big fan of the genre and found lots to like about the album, but if you're wavering, go try Blind Guardian first.

Couldn't be more cliche...
I picked up Age of Mastery after reading some good things about Jag Panzer, and listening to few song samples. I would rate this CD as a definite disappointment.

While the singer, and guitar player are solid, the music is boring and rehashed, and the lyrics are completely cliche.

These guys are a perfect example of everything that was wrong with metal in the 80s.