The discographic return of INNERWISH after 8 years is by itself a very important event. We are talking about one of the biggest and most historic bands of the Hellenic metal scene, who will complete very soon, in 2025, 30 years of existence as a band. Their legendary debut album ‘’Waiting for the Dawn’’, back in 1998, is considered by many metal fans, one of the best metal albums ever, in the whole local scene.
They present now their 6th full length album, after a remarkable time space (8 years is not a small amount of time) due to various personal reasons and of course the Covid pandemic. Apart from those reasons, the band has always kept their pace regarding releases because they always wanted to express themselves whenever they felt the need that ‘’they had something new to say’’ and not because they were obliged by label contracts or stressful time-frames – deadlines.
The first impression of the album arrives at the sight of the excellent cover artwork, that was created by Giannis Nakos of Remedy Art Design (known also for his work with AMARANTHE, KAMELOT, ARION) and is inspired by the ancient Greek myth of the Titan Prometheus, who stole fire from the Gods and offered it to humanity, thus he was punished to a relentless – eternal suffering by Zeus, the father of Gods, who tied him on a rock and sent an eagle to eat his liver every day, which was regenerated the next day.
The album starts with the song ‘’Forevermore’’, which also talks about the aforementioned myth, that has an allegorical meaning regarding the personal sacrifice someone does in order to offer warmth, freedom and protection to other people, his family or humanity in general. Musically entails an intense power metal riff which is accompanied by superb orchestration in the keyboards by Georgios Georgiou (also member in the band FORTRESS UNDER SIEGE).
At this point, I need to stress out and highlight the crystal-clear sound and the wonderful work that was applied in the whole process, from the initial recordings at LoNe and Devasoundz Studios, to the mix and mastering by Henrik Udd (known also for his work with bands such as HAMMERFALL, POWERWOLF, SEPTIC FLESH) and the co-production of the album by the band and Fotis Benardo (owner of Devasoundz Studios, producer, sound engineer and drummer to several bands such as NIGHTFALL, NIGHTRAGE, ex-member in SEPTIC FLESH etc.). The production is ideal and the sound quality is superb with all instruments and the vocals to culminate in a very pleasant way to the ear of the listener.
The next 3 songs in the album, are the 3 songs that were chosen as the singles, to pave the way for the album presentation to the fans. I would say that the selection was almost perfect because we are talking about a wonderful triplet of songs, which are, if not the best songs of the album, absolutely the major highlights of it.
‘’Sea of Lies’’ entails a duet in the vocals between the emblematic, melodic and dynamic voice of George Eikosipentakis and the famous Hansi Kürsch, singer of BLIND GUARDIAN. To be honest, it’s been a long time since I enjoyed so much the voice of Hansi just like the old days and I mean in a new direct power metal song and not in the more complicated formulas that they tend to use nowadays in contemporary albums of BLIND GUARDIAN. Of course, the song reminds in a way BLIND GUARDIAN and their mid ‘90s era. The song has amazing guitar work by the guitarists and founders of INNERWISH Manolis Tsigos and Thimios Krikos.
‘’Higher’’, that follows, is a very emotional song, describing the special relationship between parents and children. The vibe of HELLOWEEN influence is very obvious and welcome to my ears.
‘’Soul Asunder’’ is maybe my favorite song of the album, which talks about the struggles in life and the obstacles or darkness we need as humans to overcome. The song is indeed one of the heaviest in the album blended by a terrific super hooking chorus with a strong message.
The album has indeed quite a substantial duration of almost 68 minutes in total. It is comprised of 11 songs and there is a 12th song as a bonus track (a BLACKFOOT cover) for the physical format (I find it great that the LP and CD versions have their bonus track since we support physical formats) and I am not going to go down the road of doing a track-by-track analysis. That’s not the purpose and the review would become so enormous that would be exhausting or boring to read. After all, the music is to be listened to and not be read.
The point of this review is to convey the message why this album worth the time and attention of the listener.
The album, first of all, reminded me why I loved European power metal back in the days, late ‘80s – early ‘90s.
That was long before the term euro power metal would be degenerated and would describe soundtracks of video games, Eurovision music contest or ‘’kindergarten happy metal’’.
Here we are talking about serious quality European power metal in the vein of the best era of HELLOWEEN, STRATOVARIUS, BLIND GUARDIAN and with elements that remind also bands from the other side of the Atlantic, which followed this style of music, such as SYMPHONY X and KAMELOT.
That means meticulous songwriting, stimulating musical arrangements, inspiring melodies, brilliant choruses, solid rhythm section (Antonis Mazarakis on bass and Fragiskos Samoilis on drums) and intricate solos. The songs are crafted carefully, they are of equal quality and the lyrics are down to earth and humancentric. They approach the subjects that they are elaborating in the most thoughtful way, which is an element to be highly appreciated.
INNERWISH are back with an album that stands high and is worthy of their name and set the European power metal quality standards equally high.
Not to be missed, by any reason!
‘’Ash Of Eternal Flame’’ will be released on the 8th of November 2024 by Reigning Phoenix Music and will be available on Double LP, CD and Digital Format.
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Check the discussion about the album in our forum pages.
