Myrath’s sixth album ‘Karma’ is a difficult album to review for me, because I like it, but at the same time, it shows some developments that will make me approach future releases of the band with a reasonable degree of caution. If well-written and expertly arranged melodic metal is what you are after, ‘Karma’ is highly recommended. The album is full of huge melodic hooks and it might actually be even more varied than its two predecessors. And yet, as someone who has followed the band since their sophomore album ‘Desert Call’, I fear Myrath is slowly losing its identity.

Please allow me to explain what I mean by that. When I first heard Myrath, they overwhelmed me with their inventive, yet surprisingly listenable blend of progressive metal, power metal and prominent Tunisian ma’luf overtones in their rhythms and string arrangements. The progressive edge has largely been sanded off over time, with the excellent ‘Legacy’ and its follow-up ‘Shehili’ sounding more or less like a North-African take on Kamelot’s sound. So far, nothing shocking. But whether it’s a result of founding keyboard player Elyes Bouchoucha leaving or not, Myrath barely even sounds Tunisian anymore, save for some subtle touches.

However, as close as it gets sometimes, it’s not like Myrath has gone full European metal festival pop with heavy guitars on ‘Karma’. Album highlight ‘Child of Prophecy’ is a gorgeous progressive metal track with some of Malek Ben Arbia’s heaviest riffs on the album and a fantastic vocal performance by Zaher Zorgati. The exuberant opening salvo of ‘To the Stars’ and ‘Into the Light’ does an excellent job getting you excited for the album as well. Both are upper mid-tempo songs with a healthy dose of melody and a very cathartic chorus. These will surely work well on stage.

The moments that bother me the most about ‘Karma’ largely do so because of productional choices. The horns in ‘Words Are Falling’ sound awkward as hell. Don’t get me wrong: I love seventies soul almost as much as heavy metal, but they do nothing to enhance the song. The ridiculously loud piano is really distracting on the otherwise fairly good ‘Temple Walls’, while the AOR keyboards make the verses of ‘Let It Go’ sound very dated. One stylistic detour that does work, however, is ‘Candles Cry’. Its main riff almost sounds like a laid-back rock riff, which is enlarged by the rhythms, and the staccato vocal harmonies in its chorus are really cool.

While the overall tone of this review might come across as somewhat negative, ‘Karma’ is a good album overall. There is some great songwriting here, but I do feel that if Myrath keeps going even further into this direction, they will lose everything that makes them unique. And it probably doesn’t take more than a bit of melismatic singing here and some more prominent percussion there to get it back. Judged as a melodic power metal album without the history that Myrath has, however, ‘Karma’ is a good, surprisingly varied listening experience that Kamelot can learn a lesson or two from.

Recommended tracks: ‘Child of Prophecy’, ‘To the Stars’, ‘The Wheel of Time’, ‘Candles Cry’