563. Gamma Ray / Insanity and Genius. 1993. 3.5/5

In the first three years of the band’s existence, Gamma Ray had not only recorded two excellent albums in “Heading for Tomorrow” and “Sigh No More”, they had also toured around Europe and other countries to rapturous applause, and their profile had been growing at an exponential rate. All of this was occurring despite the fact that the band lineup itself was in a constant flux. Having begun with Uwe Wessel on bass and Mathias Burchardt on drums, and with Kai Hansen playing all guitars, on “Sigh No More” Uli Kusch had come in on drums, and Dirk Schlacter was on rhythm guitar. Following the tour to promote this album, both Wessel and Kusch left, citing disagreements with what was happening within the band. Kusch eventually went on and replaced Ingo Schwichtenberg in Helloween. This meant that Gamma Ray had to recruit two new players again, and so in their places came Jan Rubach on bass guitar and Thomas Nack on drums, both from the band Anaesthesia.
With the new lineup now in place, it came time to write and record for the follow up album. However, the difficult part about this was that while the majority of the band lived in Hamburg, lead singer Ralf Scheepers lived almost 700km away, and didn’t want to relocate to Hamburg because he still had a job he was working in back where he was living. This meant that he would only show up for weekends to check out how the writing process was going, or to rehearse with the band. As Kai himself was quoted as saying in an interview some years later, “there was one problem with that because when we wrote the songs I was always trying to think of his voice but on the other hand it would have been a lot better if he writes his own vocal lines, melodies and lyrics. When he came to Hamburg most of the times I was singing in the rehearsal room when he was not there and I was singing on my demos so it was like everything was more or less fixed and he could not really change it.”
All of this lead to what turns out to be the most haphazard Gamma Ray release ever, and given that this was the way it was written and recorded, it isn't too much of a surprise why.

From the outset there seems a definite move away from the more serious tone taken on the “Sigh No More” album and return to the more carefree upbeat feeling of the debut album. Whether or not this came about more from Ralf’ absence in the writing stage is unclear, as he had been a main contributoir to the lyrics for that album, but had very little on this new album.
"Insanity and Genius” kicks off as brilliantly as you would expect, with an opening triumvirate of songs that showcase the best that the band has to offer. "Tribute to the Past" is a fast paced and fun filled journey, with bright and breezy lyrics and great guitars that set off a great start. This is followed by “No Return” where Ralf’ vocals dominate throughout and set the tone for what is to come. The third of these three opening Hansen penned tracks is “Last Before the Storm”, where the Nack’s double kick rumbles the song along at the great pace that Gamma Ray like to set with their opening tracks, and keep the momentum going.
After this great beginning, I must admit that I feel the album from this point on is just a bit uneven. Indeed, the tracks through the middle of the album are just a bit average. Everyone has their chance to contribute to the writing here, and perhaps that is part of what muddles up the overall picture, but in the end there are songs here that are fine to listen to but they become just a tad boring. “The Cave Principle” and “Future Madhouse” are just middle-of-the-road tracks, along with both “Insanity and Genius” and “18 Years”. Even the cover of Birth Control's “Gamma Ray” lacks a certain presence that a later update down the track with Kai on vocals really does fix nicely.
The final three songs do return some of the band’s best elements to the album. Two songs are left to other band members to sing, which can only have eventuated from the fact that Ralk was not around to do the vocals in the studio and so they were turned over to the other band members. “Your Torn is Over” is written by Dirk, and so he also sings it here, and it is a great track, with plenty of enthusiasm from the fill-in vocalist to make it a good song to listen to. This is followed by the live favourite "Heal Me" which is sung by Kai, his first lead vocal on a song since Helloween’s debut album “Walls of Jericho”. It is interesting that Kai did this, given what happened on future releases by Gamma Ray. I'm not as big a fan of "Heal Me" as most other Gamma Ray fans seem to be. I think it's OK but not brilliant.
The final song is “Brothers”, a song about being ‘brothers in rock’, co-written by Hansen, Scheepers and Schlacter, and an interesting statement by the three solid core members of the band... up to this point.

I was ecstatic when this album was released. Those who have listened to the episode of this podcast from Season 1 about their “Sigh No More” album will know how obsessed I became over it when I got it, and I can tell you that my excitement levels for this album were humongously over the top. And in the main, we all know just what happens when you build an album up too much before its release. And that is exactly what happened to me with “Insanity and Genius”. I expected and wanted more of what I had got with “Sigh No More”, and that is not what this album offered. Once again, as with most albums such as this, it isn’t a bad album. It’s just that I expected something different, something... BETTER! And that’s not what this is. And, what hurts this album even more, is that later on when the band released their best-of album, and to do so they re-recorded all of their past songs with their current line-up so that it wouldn’t just be a generic best of album, and they re-recorded four songs from this album with Kai singing and the songs given even better guitar treatment, they left these versions in the dust.
So yes this album is fine, but for me it is my least favourite of all Gamma Ray albums – by a long way.
This was Ralf's final album with Gamma Ray, as he and the band parted amicably as he went off to try and become Rob Halford’s replacement in Judas Priest. When he missed out on that gig he went and formed his own band, and though he has made an excellent fist of his move to Primal Fear, in some way this album seems to suffer from his appearance (or lack of it). It is a pity that his final fling with the band proves to be a little disappointing. The golden age of Gamma Ray began with their following album, “Land of the Free”. It's funny how I almost missed that, as after this album my adoration of the band went a little cold, and I didn't rush out to find the next release straight away. Imagine if I hadn't! But that was how this album left me in the long run - a little uneasy, and not really sure if they could recover. That they did in amazing style is something we can all be very very glad of.