Heart of a Dragon Lies at the Edge of Time (Imaginations From The Other Side - Blind Guardian)

Member Name: Frankingsteins

Product:	Imaginations From The Other Side - Blind Guardian
Date:	22/02/08 (16 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Arguably Blind Guardian's finest achievement, every song is a power metal classic.

Disadvantages: May prove too loud for those who heard 'Lord of the Rings' and thought this was a folk band.

'Imaginations' is a stunning album from Blind Guardian that instantly established them as the leading force in power metal, an achievement that was arguably topped by their own 'Nightfall in Middle-Earth' before a lack of consistent album releases and deviation into less satisfying realms relegated them to mere god status. Powerful, furious, epic and delicate, this is a huge step beyond their first four albums and boasts a 100% success rate from its nine songs, all of which still form the bulk of live set-lists today. While 'Nightfall' was more ambitious and majestic, 'Imaginations' is the peak of Blind Guardian's "live" performance, backed up by subtle, sweeping orchestration but primarily capturing the four band members working together to create a string of metal classics. Heavy metal doesn't get any better than this.

Each song is unique and fairly dissimilar from its brethren, but all can be roughly grouped according to style. The opening title song is a grand and crushing piece with a more harmonious chorus and a series of frantic guitar riffs and solos from André Olbrich pushed forwards by the steadily tolling bell, and even at an expansive seven minutes it never becomes tiresome or overly repetitive. This epic take on speed metal does much to satisfy fans of the band both old and new, and while both 'Born in a Mourning Hall' and 'Another Holy War' sound a little weaker by direct comparison for following a similar style and both relying on repetition, they're wisely separated out to maintain the effect.

'I'm Alive' is a great song for Thomas Stauch's drums, which are really brought out in the album production and make for a distinctly heavy sound - perhaps too heavy and domineering for those unattracted to loud rock drummers like Cozy Powell - and also features a fantastically screaming chorus from singer Hansi Kürsch, whose vocals are really at their very best in this album, demonstrating his entire range within a few seconds of the chorus to the brilliant 'Mordred's Song' and finally succeeding in hitting the right soft singing voice after somewhat failed experiments on the previous couple of albums.

Hansi gets to prove his singing abilities in this album's folk ballad 'A Past and Future Secret,' a little less memorable and nowhere near as classic as the more rusty 'The Bard's Song' from the previous album but nonetheless its worthy successor. The shortest song on the album, its second half is grander, enhanced by flutes and orchestral percussion, in the way its distant ancestor 'Lord of the Rings' attempted to less success, and these folk elements creep into the softer sections of other songs, particularly the half-ballad/half-rocker 'Mordred's Song' which is one of the album's greatest triumphs.

'Bright Eyes' is its natural companion, and while featuring the best solos of the album as well as some of its finest riffs, the beginning also sees Hansi playing around with the seventies rock influences that would become so prominent in later albums, where he effectively tries to mimic Russel Mael from Sparks. Similar soft elements, enhanced by a choral presence, make the finale 'And the Story Ends' the perfect album closer and a strangely emotive one to boot, though perhaps it's just my longing for more material from this brief spell of creative brilliance.

Power metal fans couldn't ask for more than 'Imaginations from the Other Side' provides (what a strange sentence), with its mix of powerful, fast songs and slower ballads all evoking the same fantasy themes as the band's previous and later work, in a more powerful metal performance. Once the listener develops familiarity with the album it's impossible to resist smiling or even loudly singing along to the fantastically incessant choruses of 'The Script for My Requiem,' 'Another Holy War,' 'Born in a Mourning Hall' and pretty much every other song from the album, and those who were perhaps turned off by the narrative elements of 'Nightfall in Middle-Earth' will be glad to find a stripped-down metal performance here, albeit one that retains the orchestral grandeur. Buying any Blind Guardian live release pretty much invalidates the need to own this album as every song will undoubtedly be reproduced, but you still have to buy it anyway because it's amazing, and you should do everything I tell you.

1. Imaginations from the Other Side
2. I'm Alive
3. A Past and Future Secret
4. The Script for My Requiem
5. Mordred's Song
6. Born in a Mourning Hall
7. Bright Eyes
8. Another Holy War
9. And the Story Ends

Summary: Blind Guardian's fifth studio album (1995).