Rocktopia: Stratovarius - 'Elysium' - CD Review

A Rocktopia / Fireworks Magazine album review by Dave Cockett: With an expansive history that goes back more than 20 years, Finland's Stratovarius are quite rightly lauded as one of the founding fathers of modern day symphonic power metal. Their first couple of studio forays were admittedly inclined towards a more traditional type of power metal, but with first 'Dreamspace' and then 'Fourth Dimension' (in '94 and '95 respectively), they established a post Helloween framework that really did take the genre to new heights. The much anticipated international breakthrough came a year later with the brilliant 'Episode' opus, and for the best part of a decade thereafter they were unassailable ... until it all came crashing down. http://ping.fm/MvLBy