I just learned of Ayreon over the summer and I burned through all of his albums. Here's a quick summary.

Favorites - The Final Experiment and Into the Electric Castle. These had me hooked from the first listen. I love the music, the stories were super interesting, and it just sounds good. Some stand out songs for me are The Castle Hall, The Two Gates, Eyes of Time, Listen to the Waves, and Sail Away to Avalon.

Growing to love - The Source and 01011001. I need to listen to these more to really get the story, but I really dig them. The Day That the World Breaks Down, Sea of Machines and Run Apocalypse Run, but Age of Shadows is an absolute banger. Probably one of my all time favorite Ayreon songs.

Just okay - The Human Equation, Transitus, and Theory of Everything. I liked The Human Equation, but no song really hooked me outside of Loser and I thought the overall story was just okay. Transitus had an interesting premise and good songs, but none of them hooked me either. I liked a lot of the Theory of Everything songs, but just didn't vibe with it the same way I did others.

Needs a relisten - Universal Migrator Parts 1 & 2. I enjoyed these songs, but I think I was distracted when I listened to them, so I didn't fully appreciate them. Definitely worth retrying.

Found this album's new metal ballad. Interesting choice for a single but I'm not complaining.

Just listened to this for the first time yesterday. It’s pretty enjoyable and very poppy though it can get quite crunchy and mid tempo on occasion. All the voices blend very well too. Pretty happy with this as it’s a different kind of power metal than the usual double bass high pitched stuff. 8.5/10

Here's mine:

1. Wolves of war

2. Incense and iron

3. Army of the night

4. Undress to confess

5. Sanctified with dynamite

(Honorable mention: demons are a girls best friend)

Anyone heard it? What do you think about it?

Cool band that only released a single album, back in 2009. The band featured Manticora's Lars Larsen on vocals and this song features additional vocals from Pharaoh's Tim Aymar(RIP). It's literally Edgar Allen Poe set to music, good stuff.

A bonus song from Dark Asylum album.

Virgin Steele - 2001 - The Book Of Burning - Rain Of Fire

WE SUMMON THE SONS OF ANU,

SPIRITS OF LIVING FIRE!!!In the night we gather for the slaying of the beast

The chosen kings of fire summoned by the priests

lord give me strenght to crush my enemies

Their pain and their suffering will be Music to my ears

Rain Of Fire - wash away my pain, wash away my fate

Let me rise up born again

Rain Of Fire - blood runs from the sky, I'm the lord of flies

On the wings of hate I rise

Soon it will be over abd we'll gather for the feast

Hear the weeping of their woman as they grovel at our feet

The gods have shown their favor, my victory is known

Your gods have proven false, your death is mine to own

Rain Of Fire - wash away my pain, wash away my tears

Let me rise up born again

Rain Of Fire - give power to my call, devouring their flesh

Purify as all - Rain Of Fire

Trample to dust in the fire of lust

With fire we slay all who stand in our way

A covenant bound in the world underground

We slash and we strike see your head on a spike

Once free and so brave, now your people are slaves, oh...

Rain Of Fire - the sons of Anu rise, the fields of blood are mine

On a burning horse I ride

Rain Of Fire - ravager of towns our covenant is bound

In your kingdom underground

Rain Of Fire - rape our enemies, burn their village bright

In a golden wall of light

Rain Of Fire - blood runs from the sky, the veils of death divide

And the crucified arise - Rain Of Fire!!!

This album seems to have gone under a lot of power metal fan’s radars. The album is truly fantastic. I gave it 10/10 in my review on my channel. It’s a truly magnificent masterpiece. Look forward to seeing them live one day…

Where your song exists on a RPG Hex map and your band mates are represented as avatars? And individual solos, rhythm tracks are represented as monuments on the map that can contain historical lore about the track.

I've been working on a tabletop RPG that also functions as a DAW. Every song you create turns into a quest and you can keep adding members to your band as you progress through the map (just like a real RPG quest).

You can imagine why power metal was a huge inspiration behind this style of songwriting :)

Maybe should be parsed as Angra featuring Amanda (paying tribute, of course, to the band's founding vocalist). But submitted here in this particular moment as a spotlight for Amanda straddling the worlds of art-pop and metal, as she does.

So a few years ago I had a giant Playlist but I stopped listening to music due to my work and some annoying update from Spotify at the time and haven't listened to anything since roughly 2020. Now I am finding my enjoyment of music again and my wife suggested power metal, I really like it and heavy metal also, but power metal is my favorite. Any recommendations of bands or songs that are top favorites from you. I need to listen and make a sick playlist for me once again.

Man, I remember picking up a demo from these guys back in the early 2000's which had this song on it, but I don't recall ever hearing what became of them. Apparently they wound up putting out 4 albums(this one being the debut, and containing all songs from the demo) and 2 EPs over ~10 years. Learn something new every day.

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Japanese metal, Dragon Guardian's 3rd album.

I found 2 colors from Apple music and Spotify (Blue / Perple)

So I bought the real CD by Merucari, it is purple.

What is the Blue one? Is it kind of digital album?

One of my favorite bands.