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Artist: Illusion Suite |
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I’m always amazed when a really good band comes out of the Scandinavian quarter, whether it be a known band's new album or a new bands debut release, the quality is always bountiful. The latest Scandinavian sensations are Norway’s Illusion Suite whose debut release 'Final Hour' is a master class is great Melodic Prog Metal. The band fit in between the masterful genius of Dream Theater and the passion of great heavy metal. From
the opening assault of ‘The W.I.R.E’, the intense musicianship
shines through. Singer Bill
Makatowicz is a towering force on the vocal front, backed to the hilt by
the tremendous guitar work of Oyvind "Lionhart" Larsen, the
storming rhythm section of Dag Erik Johnsen on bass and Roger Bjorge on
the drums. The
album is filled to the brim with extremely huge tunes full of bellowing
bass and soar away guitars, true traits of the genre, but it’s the
vocals of Makatowicz that really set this band from the rest. He
has a passion about his vocal that even on CD shines through and is felt
throughout the entire album. With great metal anthems like
‘Scarlet Skies’, the massive ‘Once We Were Here’ and the
phenomenal eight-minute masterpiece that is ‘A Moment To Remember’,
these songs just blow you away. But
these are just the bottom layer of the cake, the jam filling and the
icing are yet to come. The album continues it's mammoth path with
‘The Passage’. A song that starts off in with a gentle refrain
with just Makatowicz and an acoustic Larsen, before bursting into an all
out Melodic Metal master class of style and grace, and the addition of a
female vocal in the track takes this one to new heights of splendor. The
seven minute plus track ‘Pandora’s Box’ is the jam in the middle
of the cake I was referring to. This is one where every band
member makes his mark on the listener. Towering guitar solo’s
from Larsen, with a monstrous back beat from Bjorge all equaling the
sound-scape from Johnsen on the bass. All this is wrapped up in
those superb vocals of Makatowicz. The
icing on the cake has to be the fifteen minute epic ‘The Adventures Of
Arcan’, this is where the Dream Theater references come into play. As
the track opens up that DT feel is present, but it's when the track
really opens up, the full might of Illusion Suite is pushed to the
forefront with this Prog Metal monster. The album closes with the shortest track on the album ‘A Ghost From The Past’. A powerful mix of tuned down guitars and a thunderous rhythm section that rounds off what is great debut from a band, who have a big future ahead of them in this genre if this release is anything to go by. I don’t know about 'Final Hour' but it sure is "Finest Hour", or to be more precise "Finest 61 minutes and 48 seconds!".
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Tracklisting:
01.
The W.I.R.E.
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