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Track Listing: Darkest Hours Under Flaming Skies Infernal Maze Fairness Justified The Game Never Ends Lifetime In A Moment Move The Mountain Event Horizon Elysium

Finnish power metal quintet Stratovarius are ready to release their thirteenth studio album "Elysium". Looking at the artwork, it bears resemblance to the 2000 release "Infinite" in the sense that it offers a contrast in scenes combined together, and in addition, the star-shaped spacecraft from the previous album "Polaris" makes another appearance. This alone has captured my interest as to whether the music also follows a similar pattern.

The album begins in typical Stratovarius style with "Darkest Hours", and words like epic, grand, symphonic and melodic can be aptly used to describe the music on the track. Jens Johansson's keyboard, Matias' guitar and Timo's vocals create quite a powerful combination. This is just a sign of things to come, a calm before the storm. The storm begins to an extent with "Under Flaming Skies", which is more of a power metal tune and isn't as progressive or neo-classical as some Stratovarius tunes can be. The chorus is rather catchy and should certainly please the fans. "Infernal Maze" follows, and offers much greater musical depth, with a beautiful build up by Timo. The guitar-keyboard harmony and then the trade-off solos come across as sugar to the grateful ears, and somewhat reminds me of the fantastic duels between Alexi Laiho and Janne Wirman for Children Of Bodom. This song has "instant classic" written all over it from start to finish, and I'm sure it'll prove to be that way among all fans.

"Fairness Justified" is another tune in which Timo shows off his vocal range, as it's a slower, more keyboard-oriented tune that requires powerful vocals, for the most part anyway. For the part that's not keyboard dominant, Matias holds his own emphatically with a mesmerizing guitar solo. "The Game Never Ends" is another one of the shorter, more precise, traditional power metal tunes decorated with a superb keyboard solo. It's great that they have included songs like Under Flaming Skies and The Game Never Ends, tracks that offer a pleasant deviation from the progressive and symphonic elements on the rest of the album, plenty of which is on offer in the next track "Lifetime In A Moment". Lauri Porra's thunderous bass sound is the unique aspect of this tune, and makes this probably the heaviest tune on the album. This song exudes the kind of atmosphere that justifies it's title. This will be clearer to you when you listen to the song yourself.

"Move The Mountain" continues in a similar vein and treats the listeners with some intricately layered music. Although the tempo remains the same throughout the song, the high level of musical richness that results from the combination of the five musicians is quite evident, and is almost orchestral which is saying a lot for music composed and performed by just five people. "Event Horizon" is a fast tune laden with plenty of solos and guitar-keyboard duels, and is my favorite on the album. It will make a great live song and I hope it's a part of their live shows in months to come. That leaves us with the 18-minute masterpiece, the title track "Elysium". It builds up to its peak much quicker than I expected it to, within a couple of minutes. After that it's just decorated with abundance of rich music that will leave the listener spellbound. The slow, quiet, atmospheric segments in the last five minutes of the song are my favorite. It brings the album to a breathtaking finish.

The album does have elements from The "Infinite" and "Polaris" albums, but offers plenty that's new, and shows the band's progress as a group. Being a stable group with no line-up changes since the previous album's release has definitely helped them in refining their sound and getting used to each other's songwriting styles. Recommended tracks are "Infernal Maze", "The Game Never Ends", "Lifetime in A Moment", "Event Horizon" and "Elysium", while the others will also grow on you with each subsequent listen. Boasting of nine very rich, diverse and atmospheric set of songs, I foresee Elysium to go down as one of the most enjoyable releases of the year 2011.