Melodic Heavy Metal

The Ferrymen, the high powerful trio, formed by masterful Swedish guitarist/songwriter/producer Magnus Karlsson (Primal Fear, Magnus Karlsson's Free Fall), awesome vocalist Ronnie Romero (Lords of Black, Sunstorm, Rainow), and thunderous drummer Mike Terrana (Rage, Axel Rudi Pell, etc.), have become an established name amongst European melodic metal fans after their first three successful albums, Fans should now prepare themselves for album four! The Ferryman have wrapped up work on "Iron Will" and once again, the band takes the classic heavy metal sound and combine it with heavier, updated songwriting textures and arrangements. “Iron Will” is certainly a huge shot of adrenaline for all lovers of melodic heavy metal!

Shining Black is a melodic metal band featuring vocalist Mark Boals (Yngwie Malmsteen, Ring Of Fire, Royal Hunt) and guitarist Ölaf Thorson (Labyrinth, Vision Divine). Their self-titled debut (2020) showcased cutting edge melodic metal songwriting techniques from Thorsen combined with the outstanding vocal abilities of Boals. Thorson and Boals now present “Postcards From the End of the World”, their sophomore album, which again highlights the outstanding collaboration between the two musicians. This album takes up where the debut left off, comprised of ten songs of modern power metal with the combination of Boals’ lung-busting vocals and Thorsen’s blistering guitar skills. Completing the lineup are Oleg Smirnoff on keyboards & piano, Nik Mazzucconi on bass, and Matt Peruzzi on drums. Shining Black's second album will once again delight power metal fans with its accomplished musicianship and empowering vocals… Euro-metal fans get excited!

One of the top Metal singers of the past decade, Norway’s Jorn Lande vocals resonate again with bluesy lung vigor overtones in JORN’s eighth original studio album entitled “Traveller”.

When cooking up one of your favorite old recipes, sometimes adding different spices and/or ingredients to the usual mixture will excite your taste buds, and in the end, bettering the original formula. The same can be said for music, and CRYSTAL BALL is a perfect example…

Vikings and metal tend to go together very well, and the idea of combining the two has obviously been made popular by the likes of Swedish melodic death metal band Amon Amarth and German power metal band Rebellion, and now a new challenger has arrived to prove themselves worthy of fighting for Odin. That band is Brothers of Metal, from Sweden, and they have unleashed their debut Prophecy of Ragnarok, which is not only an incredibly addictive power metal album, with varying influences from other genres and a ton of different exciting elements, but it also happens to be perhaps the very best Viking themed metal album I’ve ever heard, as the band takes familiar ideas and mashes them together perfectly, while also managing to create their own distinct sound that really has to be heard…

"In the Beginning" is the debut album by Swiss melodic metal/melodic hard rock band "Crystal Ball", originally released in 1999 and reissued this summer by AFM records following the reissue of their iconic album "Hard impact". While lately recognized as a heavy/power metal outfit with high profile release in these genres, "Crystal Ball" stated out as a band that drew elements from both hard rock and metal standing right between the two. In fact the melodic hard rock/glam metal sound of the late `80s was vastly influential on their early works.

Heavy Load from Sweden were one of the earliest European Metal groups along with Accept, Trance, Torch, and early Scorpions. Much like other high quality but under appreciated European traditional metal bands (220 Volt, Overdrive, Ostrogoth, Avenger) Sweden’s beery Vikings Heavy Load slugged it out in the trenches long before anybody bothered to notice ‘em. Partially to blame were ludicrously small and poorly distributed pressing of their records, but no metal this good should go unheard for any reason, damn it. Bringing the energy and passion of Motorhead to bear on Scorpions derived clever guitar stylings, Heavy Load embody a hopeful, anthemic sound evoking Viking anthems sung after a lost but well fought battle.

Sweden's melodic Metal overlords DREAM EVIL will release “Gold Medal In Metal (Alive & Archive)”, their first live-release as DVD and CD, including a comprehensive Bonus-CD compilation of more than an hour of quality rare and unreleased studio tracks on August 25th, 2008…. – centurymedia.com