The Savatage Thread

[wolfking]

SWF is probably the CIIC album that needs the most time.  For the style of music, it's amazing how much of a grower it is.

[Mister Gold]

Personally, I like the new version, but while the narration does flesh out the story of the record considerably, I do agree that it doesn't really help with the presentation, and if anything it breaks up the flow of the album.  Furthermore, while some clarification on the album's plot is appreciated, the story wasn't really that difficult to figure out anyways.

I haven't had a chance to hear the new version yet, but this was something that immediately crossed my mind when it was first announced.  I generally find that concept albums suffer in pacing when there is a bunch of narrative parts interlaced.

[The Dark Master]

So while I keep myself pretty well up to date with Jon Oliva interviews, I should really start keeping an eye open for Paul O'Neill interviews as well.  As the other half of the main songwriting team of Savatage and TSO, Paul is the other guy who seems to have the most influence over the affairs in the world of SavaTSO, so anything he says on the subject of possible future Savatage happenings is worth checking out.  As it happened, he did talk about Savatage in an interview he did back in January:  https://www.radiometal.com/en/article/songs-and-legends-from-trans-siberian-orchestra-by-paul-oneill,133201

He's the part where he talks about Savatage:

You’ve been one of the main lyricists and composers in Savatage for many years, but the band has been on hiatus for a long time. Do you think there’s a chance to see Savatage revived in the future?

Honestly, both Jon Oliva and myself would love that. Trans-Siberian Orchestra was started in ’93, which is right after Oliva left Savatage. For a while, we aimed to keep both bands going – especially when Criss Oliva was alive, so he took care of Savatage. But after Criss died, there was no original member left in Savatage, so Jon and I concentrated back on that. We had Handful Of Rain for Savatage, then Dead Winter Dead, then a TSO album, then a Savatage album, then a TSO album… Savatage albums are very complicated and expensive to make, and it’s the same thing for TSO albums. Both bands spend millions of dollars for one record, because it’s not two guitars, bass and drums. So the problem became time. We loved both bands, but, you know… The European promoters were like: “How come TSO’s not touring Europe?” the Asian promoters were like: “Why are you not touring in Asia?”, the record labels are like: “Where’s the Savatage album? Where’s the TSO album?” Jon and I were going 24 hours a day, seven days a week. The single biggest problem, Philippe, was simply time. We love Savatage, we wanted it to be the first progressive metal band, which I think they accomplished. Eddie Trunk, who’s very famous in America – he’s an expert on rock –, traced down Black Sabbath as the first heavy metal band, Ronnie James Dio as the one who came up with the metal signs, and Savatage as the first prog metal band. But we reached a limit with what you can do within one band. With TSO, because you have 24 lead singers, you can really push and try different things. You know, I’m nearly 60, and Jon’s not far behind me – and we have so much to do!

So we’d love to do another Savatage album and a farewell tour, or something. But again, we don’t want to do it for the money, we don’t want to do it cheaply. We want to do it right. The band has to rehearse for two months, put together a really great production. But our single biggest problem is that, honestly, every album we’re turning in is late. Night Castle was supposed to come out in 2005, and it came out in 2009. The last TSO album was supposed to come out in 2012, and we still haven’t turned it in yet. We’re just horrible at meeting deadlines. It’s funny you should mention that, by the way, because when we’re touring Europe this year, Philippe, we’re calling it the “Past, Present and Future Tour”. Most of the songs will be from TSO’s present albums; a couple of songs will be unreleased TSO songs – they haven’t been in the studio, but they’re done; and we’re going to do about four or five songs from Savatage, because a lot of Savatage members are in Trans-Siberian Orchestra. You can still get these songs on CD, but songs want to be performed live. What’s the point of a great book if it just sits on a library shelf? There’s a magic to live that you can’t capture on a record. So since we have so many of the Savatage guys in TSO, when we were doing rehearsals, somebody said: “Why don’t we do Savatage songs, since we’re gonna be over there?” I was like: “I think it’s a great idea”. And the members of TSO who were never in Savatage, they love Savatage, so they’re excited about it, too. So until we get around to putting Savatage back up for a regular tour, this is kind of like halfway in-between! Does that make any sense?!

Dovetailing quite nicely into that, I saw this video on youtube back in January of TSO playing Gutter Ballet on the most recent European tour which I meant to post a long time ago but kind of forgot:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mnLOkyUBsSI

I really hope they start to bring more Savatage songs into the stateside sets, we need more Savatage on this side of the pond.  Between TSO playing more Sava-tunes on their tours and Jon mentioning maybe doing an album or EP or something, I'm still holding out that something may happen under the Savatage name in the future.  I don't know what or when it will be exactly, but if Jon, Paul, Caffery and the guys are all still interested, then it has to happen!   

[jjrock88]

I'm confident there will be something from Savatage in the future. 

[Dittomist]

I had no idea that Trans-Siberian Orchestra had started playing Gutter Ballet! And the vocalist totally nailed it, wow! Thanks for sharing.

[abydos]

I wasn't too impressed with the singer until the end. For some reason I was sure his voice just isn't capable of doing what he did.

[Podaar]

Dovetailing quite nicely into that, I saw this video on youtube back in January of TSO playing Gutter Ballet on the most recent European tour which I meant to post a long time ago but kind of forgot:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mnLOkyUBsSI

 

[bl5150]

Any diehard Savatage collectors need to check this out

Recorded on the famous 501 label   

https://www.ebay.com/itm/SAVATAGE-THE-WAKE-OF-MEGELLAN-THAI-CASSETTE-RARE-/351102932095?ssPageName=ADME:B:SS:AU:3160

[Lowdz]

Watched the GB video - now I've always thought it would sound better with a great singer than Jon but I guess I was wrong. Nathan James is a great singer but that just wasn't great.
Props to Jon. I'll take his version.

[wolfking]

Any diehard Savatage collectors need to check this out

Recorded on the famous 501 label   

https://www.ebay.com/itm/SAVATAGE-THE-WAKE-OF-MEGELLAN-THAI-CASSETTE-RARE-/351102932095?ssPageName=ADME:B:SS:AU:3160

That looks so dodgy.

[jjrock88]

Any diehard Savatage collectors need to check this out

Recorded on the famous 501 label   

https://www.ebay.com/itm/SAVATAGE-THE-WAKE-OF-MEGELLAN-THAI-CASSETTE-RARE-/351102932095?ssPageName=ADME:B:SS:AU:3160

What is the 501 label.  That cassette looks so cheap, like the pack of 10 cassettes that Superstore used to sell in my area.

[wolfking]

Yeah, it's like someone lost the tape but then recorded it on a blank $3 tape from the CD or something.

[bl5150]

I was being sarcastic jj - I'm assuming it's a Teac 501 blank tape.  Teac uses the "501" name on some of its other products too.  In the listing he states that the record label is "501".

I just thought it was a funny Dodgy Brothers style listing 

[wolfking]

So we were right then. 

[jjrock88]

How does this Shyster have a 100% rating

[wolfking]

How does this Shyster have a 100% rating

Everything else he is selling is legit, so I'm guessing it's just a one of, but seems strange.  Perhaps he has never sold one of these dodgies before so has never had the opportunity to be given a lower rating.

[The Dark Master]

Well, it finally happened: https://www.wacken.com/en/woa2014/main-news/news/ansicht/article/woa-2015-erste-bands-bestaetigt-9725/

Savatage is playing Wacken as part of TSO's appearance there next year.

I really hope something similar will happen in the US or, if not, at least having a DVD release or a livestream of the show for those of us who cannot afford to fly all the way to Germany.

[jjrock88]

This is a positive.......hopefully it leads to something more.

[wolfking]

About time, fingers crossed for a studio album.

[The Dark Master]

Agreed.  I said it before and I'll say it again: as awesome as it would be to see Savatage play live again, I'm craving a new album much, much more.  Those guys still had a lot of creative gas left in the tank coming off of Poets And Madmen, they really should have made a few more albums before throwing in the towel.

At any rate, I read that Wacken 2015 sold out within 12 hours of the announcement.  Props to the Savatage fans in Europe for their loyalty and patience!   

[The Dark Master]

So, with the Christmas season rolling in, I've been listening to TSO a bit heavier then I do for the rest of the year, which of course led to me listening to Savatage quite a bit (after having given them a break for a few months), which eventually led to me listening to quite a bit of JOP.  As I listen to the JOP records, I find myself wondering: what would these songs have sounded like had they been done as "Savatage"?  Granted, Jon is/was the main composer of Savatage, so the music is obviously there, but there has always been something about JOP that has never sounded quite up to the level of Savatage for me.

So I listened to the JOP records while trying to imagine what they would have sounded like as Savatage; thinking about what Paul would have brought to the table in terms of production quality, vocal melodies, lyrics and arrangements.  And also wondering how the performances of Caffery, Middleton and co. would have compared to what we got on those records with the ex-CIIC guys (no offence to them, of course).  After quite a few listens, and comparing the JOP songs with the last albums we got from Savatage (mostly P&M, but also to a lesser extent TWOM), I have to say: I could definitely hear it.  Sure, some stuff would have been different here and there, especially on Paul's end of things.  But overall, I think the songs would have mostly been the same, just a bit more "Savatage-y" sounding.

So this brings me to a question: what do you guys think about the idea of JOP being, as Jon himself said in other words, the musical successor and continuation of Savatage?  Historically, I've often held the view that TSO was the proper continuation of Savatage due to the presence of Paul and all the recent band members, as well as the fact that the whole TSO sound is a direct distillation of the style Savatage had honed on DWD.  But recently, I've become a bit less sure.  Given that many of the JOP songs were, in part or in whole, originally intended for Savatage in the first place, and well as the fact that the more metal angle of JOP is not only more compatible with the greater part of the Savatage discography, but also a more likely continuation of the direction Savatage was going on P&M, how would you have felt about the JOP albums, with Paul and the Savatage guys on board (and all the changes that would entail), being the Savatage albums we would have gotten from 2004-2010 had the band not gone on hiatus?

[wolfking]

JOP is much more Savatage than TSO IMO.  There's a lot of JOP songs with writing credits to Criss, that does it for me.

[bl5150]

JOP is much more Savatage than TSO IMO.  There's a lot of JOP songs with writing credits to Criss, that does it for me.

I would agree.............the consistency of JOP is way down on Savatage though IMO.    There's often one or two killer songs and plenty of filler - for me anyway.

I don't tend to listen to much of the post-Criss stuff anyway , so I suppose it's all a bit moot from my point of view.  Plenty of good songs in there but I have a big attachment to the "Criss sound"

[The Dark Master]

JOP is much more Savatage than TSO IMO.  There's a lot of JOP songs with writing credits to Criss, that does it for me.

Yeah, I find myself leaning much more in the JOP direction as well these days.  I suppose that because I discovered Savatage and TSO thanks to the same song (Christmas Eve/ Sarajevo, and I honestly cannot remember if I heard it first as Savatage or TSO), I've tended to view the two bands as different sides of the same coin.  Add to that the fact that I had never even heard a note of JOP until after Festival, the 4th JOP album, was already out, and yeah, my view was clearly more skewed towards TSO "being" Savatage.

But when I listen to the Savatage discography from front to back, the JOP stuff seems to flow so easily from where Savatage left off with P&M, it cannot be by accident.  Sure, the JOP records are basically what those Savatage albums would have sounded like before Jon brought them to Paul and the rest of the band, so I'm sure the final product would have seen some significant changes.  But even if JOP is only a rough idea of what a post-P&M Savatage would have sounded like, it is still very much a direct continuation of that same core sound.

I would agree.............the consistency of JOP is way down on Savatage though IMO.    There's often one or two killer songs and plenty of filler - for me anyway.

I don't know about filler, but I definitely agree that JOP is much less consistent in quality then Savatage.  I think that's probably where Paul and the band would have helped to fill the gaps, and bring those albums up from simply being just great metal records to "one of the best bands in the world" quality.  Especially on the ballads.  There is just a magic that all the Savatage ballads from Gutter Ballet to P&M had that is simply absent from JOP, so I'm guessing Paul had a very big hand in giving Jon some help in that area.

[wolfking]

I'd say there is a bit of filler too with JOP, especially on the last one.  Global Warning is my fav and the only one that's solid from start to finish.  The debut is mostly solid too.  MR had some stunning songs and some below par ones.

Speaking of the Savatage direction, I was always fond that there were 2 Savatage sounds, the Criss stuff and the post Criss stuff, but I always couldn't help to think that after Criss died, they definitely should have continued as they did, but not under the Savatage name.

[The Dark Master]

I'd say there is a bit of filler too with JOP, especially on the last one.  Global Warning is my fav and the only one that's solid from start to finish.  The debut is mostly solid too.  MR had some stunning songs and some below par ones.

Speaking of the Savatage direction, I was always fond that there were 2 Savatage sounds, the Criss stuff and the post Criss stuff, but I always couldn't help to think that after Criss died, they definitely should have continued as they did, but not under the Savatage name.

If they had decided to drop the Savatage name after Criss' death, then I think Handful of Rain would simply have been released as a Jon Oliva album, with himself singing all the leads (which very nearly happened, IIRC; the only reason Zak sang on the final version was because Atlantic was really pushing for a new Savatage album).  After that, Dead Winter Dead and Wake of Magellan most likely would have been released as TSO albums pretty much as-is, just with a wider array of singers.  Not sure if Poets And Madmen even would have been made in that case, but if it was, then it probably would have been a Jon Oliva album too.

Which raises another interesting hypothetical scenario:  How would HOR* and P&M been received as Jon Oliva records, and DWD and TWOM as TSO records?

* this assumes that Jon, not Zak, would sing HOR if it were a solo record

[wolfking]

I'd pretty much agree with all of that, although I think P&M could easily fit under the Savatage name.  I wouldn't want DWD and TWOM done any other way, but they would definitely fit under the TSO name.  And as you said HOR is pretty much a Oliva solo record.

[The Dark Master]

To be honest, even HOR and P&M are not that different stylistically then TSO.  Sure, the music is a bit heavier and there are less instrumentals and ballads, but the songwriting is very much the same.  It's still primarily Jon and Paul, and the lyrics and vocal melodies are all Paul's anyways (on P&M, I believe HOR still had some lyrics by Jon).  P&M could be what TSO would sound like attempting a straight forward metal record.  The guitars are more prominent, but the vocal arrangements are still very similar. 

Hell, I just listened to the entire Savatage discography over the last couple days, and out of curiosity chronologically overlapped the last few Savatage records with the first few TSO albums, (so, Dead Winter Dead-> Christmas Eve & Other Stories -> The Wake of Magellan-> The Christmas Attic -> Beethoven's Last Night -> Poets and Madmen -> The Lost Christmas Eve) and there really wasn't that much of a difference aside from a heavier mix and different singers.  If the TSO albums had crunchier riffs and Jon and Zak sang all the leads, I doubt there would be any substantial difference at all.  It's entirely possible they would have continued to develop down the operatic and symphonic road rather then turning back completely to Jon metal and prog roots.  That's probably why Jon just decided to go his own way after 2002.  If Savatage was just going to be a heavier (and less profitable) TSO, then what was the point?  As many, including him, have said: it wasn't the same band without Criss anyways.

I think part of the problem for me is that the band seemed caught between the two styles by the time they did Poets and Madmen.  In someways, it was an attempt to go back to the older, more metal sound of Savatage, with less instrumentals and ballads and more heavy riffing, but in many ways, I felt they played it safe and stuck very much to the DWD/TWOM/TSO formula of songwriting, with the broad, sweeping vocal and orchestral arrangements and concepts.   I can certainly see how JOP could be considered the continuation of the P&M sound, and there are a lot of Savatage elements on those records, but the song writing is much "looser", as opposed to the "tighter" and more conceptual work that characterized Savatage. 

Anyways, don't mind me if I ramble about this.  I literally have lost sleep arguing with myself over whether I should consider TSO of JOP as the proper continuation of Savatage (not even joking  )  It's possible that had Jon kept going as Savatage, Paul's influence would have decreased as he focused on TSO and Jon would have taken Savatage down the JOP road anyways.  At any rate, this is all just academic and theoretical (though still fun to talk about); Savatage is Savatage; TSO and JOP, while each could have been Savatage, are, as is, each their own thing.

[Deathless]

CHRIS CAFFERY Says 'There's A Possibility' SAVATAGE Will Do 'Something More' After WACKEN Performance

"I'm gonna put it this way: for 12 years, 13 years, I've been waiting for my band to play again. We're playing again. I don't know what's going to happen after that [laughs], but there were people that were putting a fork in it, and we're getting up and not just running a marathon, were running in the Olympics with this festival being what it is. I'm not going to make any predictions, but let's just say there's a possibility that something more will happen after Wacken — that's all I can say. And nothing would make me happier."

 

[jjrock88]

That sounds very cool!!

[wolfking]

We can only hope.

[wolfking]

https://www.blabbermouth.net/news/jon-oliva-wants-to-get-in-shape-and-knock-people-out-at-savatage-reunion/

Good little interview with Jon.

It's so good to see him recognize his health issues and doing something about it.

[jjrock88]

Thats good to hear, Jon was in the danger zone with his weight.

[The Dark Master]

CHRIS CAFFERY Says 'There's A Possibility' SAVATAGE Will Do 'Something More' After WACKEN Performance

"I'm gonna put it this way: for 12 years, 13 years, I've been waiting for my band to play again. We're playing again. I don't know what's going to happen after that [laughs], but there were people that were putting a fork in it, and we're getting up and not just running a marathon, were running in the Olympics with this festival being what it is. I'm not going to make any predictions, but let's just say there's a possibility that something more will happen after Wacken — that's all I can say. And nothing would make me happier."

 

https://www.blabbermouth.net/news/jon-oliva-wants-to-get-in-shape-and-knock-people-out-at-savatage-reunion/

Good little interview with Jon.

It's so good to see him recognize his health issues and doing something about it.

This is all great news.   Good to hear Jon wants to get back into shape, I was starting to get a little worried about him.  Also, I was hoping that Savatage would do something after Wacken, and I can only pray that this leads to something like a new album or maybe some shows.  It's great that they've been getting offers to play in the States, as I know they have always been very underground in North America.  I wonder, though, what form a Savatage tour would take.  Would it be an actual Savatage tour, or would it be a hybrid TSO/Savatage tour like they had planed to do on the TSO spring tour back in 2011, and like the show at Wacken next year?  Either way, I'm ecstatic, and I can only hope that they will play somewhere near me!


 

[jjrock88]

I think that would be cool if they would have a Savatage set open up for TSO, even just like 45 minutes.  Finally Savatage would be getting much needed recognition and publicity.