Kamelot
Dark Asylum

Release Date: 08/28/2026 | Tracklist

The story of this present incarnation of Kamelot is so boring that I don’t want to spend more than a couple of sentences on it. After Roy Khan’s departure, the band quickly re-emerged with an excellent new singer and a “we are still here and we still know how to do it” kind of album, and everyone was reasonably happy with it. The band proceeded to release essentially the same album a couple more times, and the more inquisitive part of the fanbase started to get grumpy. “The Shadow Theory” was actually a bit riffier and heavier than the two preceding offerings, the songs were reasonably catchy and well-made, the skill and musicianship was there, but the creative spark was clearly gone.


However, “The Awakening” that followed was a curious case. It seemed like Youngblood and the crew decided to take all things Kamelot and crank them up to eleven. The guitars grumbled and rumbled, the symphonics were unprecedently big and omnipresent, the backing singer wailed like banshees, and Karevik’s lead vocals matched them in intensity. The whole album sounded like a deliberate self-parody or maybe even a parody on the entire sub-genre of symphonic metal. Say what you will, but that was one of the viable options to expand the band’s sound. Which is why I was especially curious about the follow-up album. It was meant to show if Kamelot was indeed self-aware and in on the joke or it’s the reverse and they’ve turned into a pompous and overblown ridicule with no trace of self-awareness, akin to modern Manowar. Well, now “Dark Asylum” has arrived, and I am still firmly in the grumpy camp. The band scaled down their sound: the symphonics are almost gone, the backing vocals are still mostly done by ladies, but now they are soft and tender “aaahs” instead of intense operatic assault. Yet, this is the same increasingly pretentious and theatrical Kamelot as three years ago, only this time there’s no flourish to disguise all the hollowness.


First of all, familiarity reached unparalleled levels this time. Practically every melody or riff I’ve heard made me think “didn’t they do that one already?” Some re-hashing can be expected from a seasoned band with a lot of albums under their belt, but even that can be done in a creative way, and here it often seems like Youngblood just switched a few notes or chords and presented the result as new songs. Even the intro to “Dark Asylum” sounds like a shortened version of the intro to “Silverthrorn.” Secondly, it’s all about the chorus now, and all other parts of the songs are meant to serve it. “Sanctuary” is an especially vivid example, as Karevik barely sings a few lines in the first verse before a towering chorus hits and the song reaches the level of pomposity that rivals the most pretentious Army of Lovers songs. The same formula is exercised almost universally, save for the ballads with subdued verses, big choruses, a guitar solo and a softer bridge section towards the end.


Now, I’d be lying if I said that I didn’t enjoy the album Of course, lack of originality does not always mean lack of enjoyment. There are indeed a lot of memorable choruses and excellent guitar solos from the beginning to the end of the record. Even that “Sanctuary” song that I criticized just a few sentences before is undeniable, although mostly thanks to excellent vocals by Tommy Karevik and the guest singers Clémentine Delauney and Ignacia Fernández, who also provides some harsh vocals throughout the album. They are also nothing new, we know that Kamelot likes to make women growl since “Silverthorn,” but enjoyable nevertheless. While I’m at it. All the ladies did an excellent job, including the magical trio who sang a regrettably short song in Icelandic. Tobias Sammet returns the favor after Tommy appeared on last year’s Avantasia record, and “One Last Masquerade” is a song tailor-made for his voice. It sounds like a response to “The Witch,” that Avantasia song which featured Karevik, while the riffs wouldn’t have felt out of place on an Edguy song. Meanwhile, the singers seem to challenge each other to be as theatrical as possible, only to blend their voices in the song’s “Do you feel alive?” culmination. Again, hardly original, still irresistible.


However, albums like this have limited shelf life. The first couple of listens may pass by like an ocean breeze and leave you wanting more, but the album’s pop-metal sound quickly becomes tiring. For me personally, the second half of the record lost its luster rather quickly, although it maintains roughly the same level of quality. The first ballad “Ivy, My Dear” probably suffers the most from the familiarity issue, being just a retread of “Midsummer’s Eve” from the previous album, only this time Tina Guo’s violin is not there to lend the song a bit of character and personality. It also marks a sort of breaking point, as the songs that follow, while still catchy and enjoyable, fail to generate the same feeling of dumb fun as the first batch of songs did.



Still, even at its best “Dark Asylum” has all the symptoms of a band (Thomas Youngblood first of all) in a creative rut. This is, of course, a debatable point. Some may argue that this album is a culmination of Kamelot’s modern sound. Some may say, “this is a bunch of seasoned musicians doing what they do best, what more do you need?” These are all valid claims. But I still remember the times when Kamelot blazed their own, very distinctive path, being a breath of fresh air with their darker and smarter sound in a sea of whiny vocals, fluffy neoclassical guitars and overblown symphonics that was power metal a couple of decades ago. The magic was there, and now it’s gone.


Except it was gone even before Roy Khan left. Again, this is debatable, but I would argue that the two albums that Kamelot did with him behind the mike after “The Black Halo” were already solid but weary releases. We thought it was mainly the issue of Roy’s tiredness and ultimate burnout, but the songwriting took a hit as well. Roy was never the problem, and neither is Tommy. It all depends on Thomas Youngblood now and his willingness (or lack thereof) to go beyond the established sound for the subsequent albums. Anything can happen, and there are examples of bands emerging stronger than before after even longer streaks of mediocrity like last year’s Testament or Ironbound by Overkill coming out of nowhere after years upon years of middling releases. But for now, it seems like Kamelot simply ran out of things to say.

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