Ah, Stormlord. An amazing “Extreme Epic Metal” band from Italy. This is there ninth release, one of the few that I have.
Anyway, on with the album. Well what to say about Stormlord? They have a great key player/composer, and it shows in this album. They can be very beautiful and slow one second and then dive into blast beats with ear-exploding screams the next. This album has pretty much everything Stormlord has to offer.
I’ll rate some of the best tracks.
The first song, Under The Samnites Spears, starts out with about 1 minute of keyboard, and then the rest of the band comes in. Fast paced symphonic song, with lots of different elements. Some catchy drum lines and guitar, and the chorus is just pure genius. David Folchitto has some bloody fast feat! Also has some clean Italian operatic style vocals about mid-way through the song. Around 4:47 there is a beautiful piano break, can’t miss that. Overall = 4/5
… And Winter Was is the fourth song on the album, and it really brings out the bands black metal roots. It starts with a thrashy riff with blast beats for awhile, and then goes into the verse which is easily recognized as Stormlord solely by the keyboard. About mid-way through the song there is an extremely fast drum line, song sort of starts to sound like a Gothenburg style song, and once again David’s feat blow me away. Overall = 3/5
At The Gates Of Utopia, the album’s title track, is a 2 and a half minute long instrumental, featuring amazing keyboards. Mid paced song, stays about the same pace the whole way through. Piano, horns, brass, strings, this song has everything. Very relaxing song, the perfect thing to prepare you for …
The Curse Of Medusa! My favorite from this album, quite an amazing song. I love the vocals in this song, and some of my favorite keyboards of all time. More operatic vocals on this track, and the song is very diverse. The drum never stays the same for more than 8 measures, and there are lots of different elements in this song. About 2 minutes before the song is over it goes into this slower Egyptian sounding bridge and pretty much stays there until the song ends. Great track nonetheless, definitely 5/5
Pros: Very good keyboard and vocals, amazing drums, epic songs…
Cons: The songs start to sound the same as you get further into the album, but how can’t you when you play this stuff? Also, the guitar tone may not appeal to some people, but I like it.
Overall I would give the album a 4/5
