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No doubt about it, this Saarbrücken based German Power Metal quintet (who can boast the feat of still having the same line-up as when they started out in 2003) has all the elements which will please the average (and still largest part) of the (mindless) masses into that kind of music: catchy melodies with singalong choruses, bombasticism in the form of an infusion of Classical elements, and lyrical topics (werewolves, vampires, and anti-religious themes – though the latter are meant to be ironical) which at the same time make the listener openly smile and secretly shiver.

By all means, the review of this Frankfurt based German Pop Rock/ Rock Pop quintet should've been reviewed 4 months ago, but somehow our editor-in-chief managed to waylay the download copy of the album. Ach, well...let's say that accidents will happen!

Normandy, the town of Rouen, Autumn of 2007. members of the local bands Aïdos, Krahan, Mémoria and Greenwald find a common musical ground, and strike out on their own. Thanks to their previous experiences, the band soon starts writing a set of songs with an Industrial Groove Metal sound, which they bring to Normandy's audiences starting the Summer that follows at the town's Fête De La Musique (in truth, the band only played two more shows that same year).

German Heavy Metal band working together with an orchestra?

The guys from German label Pure Steel Records turn out to be a real diverse lot, because not only have they in recent times been releasing a shitload of new albums and re-issued hidden treasures from the past, but now they're also promoting bands who have released their albums on their own. Not just bands from their own neighborhood either, because KB39 hail from Moscow, Russia!

Whenever the front(wo)man of a well-known musical act goes about making a solo album, the outcome either resembles what that musician does with his/her main band, or (just as frequently) is an acoustic version of it... Not so with James Skelly of The Coral whom, with Love Undercover, comes along with a Soul and Rhythm 'n' Blues influenced album!

Say...what kind of skullduggery is this!? According to the info we got along with our download copy of the debut album of this Palermo (Sicily) based Italian “Post Math Rock” (sic) act, this album is supposed to be relatively new, when in fact Qanat already released it back in November 2010! trying to pull a fast one over us, eh? Oh well, we don't really mind as much, you know...because we missed it the first time around, didn't we?

This band is composed of the married couple of Dexter Tortoriello and Megan Messina, and was started in 2010, after they had lived on the island of Papaikou (Hawaii) for a short period.

There's hardly any info on this Finnish band (which apparently has homebases in 4 different districts of the township of Helsinki, namely Käpylä, Ogeli, Pakilla and Paloheinä – the latter a favourite hotspot for nature lovers), except what's on their facebook (in Finnish), so I'll just copy what info the label gave us along with the download copy of the album, okay?

At the Encyclopaedia Metallum (aka (www.