DAYS OF RISING DOOM - THE METAL OPERA

Looking at this with the eyes of a power/progressive/symphonic metal fan, I must say that on paper Aina is one of the best things ever created by man. You have some pretty decent names from the realm of the above mentioned genres (especially power & symphonic) and overall you'd expect the production to be top notch. Nothing could possibly go wrong, right?

The biggest flaw the album has is the flavourless and bland execution of it all. The instruments are relatively decent, though they still lack emotion far too often. Singing varies, sometimes it's good, sometimes just plain soulless. The songs themselves are also plagued by the horribly radio friendly approach; the longest songs are 6 minutes, while the calculated average length is just below 4 and half minutes. Likewise the song structure is painfully pop-formulated, verse, chorus, verse stuff. Now I do enjoy radio friendly-esque 4 minute chorus driven songs myself as well, heck, most power metal falls into that category. The difference between most other stuff and Aina is that while most other stuff has some soul into it, Aina just comes off as if Britney Spears decided to do a metal album all of a sudden. Yes, it's that calculated & blank (at least that's the impression that it gives me).

So while this album may be good production-wise, artistically it's just as if some big record company guy decided to do something that appealed to the masses. Compare with Gamma Ray for example, they do radio friendly (what my ears regard as such, anyway) music that's 4-6 minutes long, yet despite their near banal lyrics they somehow accomplish in achieving that feeling and attitude that makes it all sound so good. I don't know, I'm pretty much Aina's target audience, I'm a sucker for grandiose operatic albums that promise the sun and the moon, the whole fantasy land approach regarding lyrics and an impressive list of guest musicians all wrapped up in some sweet power metal. But despite all the great prospects I'm left with an uninspiring album which could have been something so much better.

If you're looking for (power) metal operas, go and check Avantasia, or just settle for unoperatic power metal bands, there's plenty to choose from. If it's the opera metal you're looking for, Ayreon's always a good choice.

2 stars because while I can't see any reason to buy this lest you can find it dirt cheap, it still retains some production values.