After the remarkable 'Transitus' dating back to 2020 as part of the 'Ayreon' project, 'Arjen Anthony Lucassen' revives his 'Star One' project (originally dedicated to a 'space metal' style) with the release of 'Revel In Time' and, as usual, he invited an impressive number of artists from the metal scene with his faithful like the drummer 'Ed Warby', the keyboardist 'Joost Van Den Broek' or the singers 'Floor Jansen ', 'Marcela Bovio' and 'Irene Jansen'. For this latest baby from the Dutchman, there are also well-known artists such as guitarists 'Steve Vai', 'Timo Somers' or even 'Ron Bumblefoot Thal' (see the list of performers below with details of the titles). As Arjen himself says, "'Ayreon' is like the mothership of all my music and contains all the different musical styles that I love to listen to and love to create…whereas with 'Star One', I focus on metal.".
Indeed, 'Revel In Time', strong of a big hour of listening (the second CD presents alternative versions with other singers), shows an imposing power highlighting saturated guitar riffs and, this entry, with 'Fate of Man' which, after an introduction to the keyboards which reminds us of the familiar sounds of Arjen Lucassen's projects', deploys a beautiful energy with a memorable, constant first melody which we will find on practically all the titles and which makes this album very direct and accessible on first listening. And, how good it is to find our irresistible luxury singers, 'Marcela Bovio' and 'Irene Jansen' as in the compositions 'Fate of Man', the ultra-classic but so effective 'Led-Zeppelinian' hard-rock of the title song which takes us back to the 70s or even the catchy 'The Year of 41'. I won't launch into titles that would require a too long review, but I would simply like to point out that beyond the heavy side and the direct style of all the compositions, 'Arjen Lucassen' offers us a quite wide range panel of atmospheres, whether with titles that automatically start a foot tapping machine like 'Back from the Past', 'The Year of 41'', 'Bridge of Life' or 'Beyond the Edge of it All', but also in compositions which show a much more progressive face with remarkable rhythmic alternations between mid-tempo and sustained tempos and weak and strong moments with, for example, '28 Days (Till The End of Time ') or 'Prescient' or 'Today is Yesterday' or the magnificent 'A Hand on the Clock' in which 'Floor Jansen' is at the zenith of his talent and in which we happily find the female duet choir echoing Floor without forgetting the epic finale 'Lost Children of the Universe' which takes us on a long development in which we walk through different parts alternating in a beautiful way different intensities and mixing progressive metal and other atmospheres, first of all atmospheric with a long aerial guitar solo of 'Steve Vai', then symphonic that the choirs of the 'Hellscore Choir' make grandiose to finally fall back into the finale with a moving song from 'Roy Khan' accompanied by a few layers of keyboards.
In short, it's still a no-fault for 'Arjen Lucassen' who has this gift to make us travel once again in the space shuttle 'Star One' and offer us catchy metal that we always have immense pleasure to listen to and which will certainly make 'Revel In Time', one of the major progressive releases of the year 2022...
List of singers + instrumentalists:
1 = Fate of Man: Brittney Slayes (Vocal), Michael Romeo (Guitar)
2 = 28 Days (Till the End of Time): Sir Russell Allen (Vocal), Timo Somers (Guitar) 3 = Prescient: Micheal Mills (Vocal), Ross Jennings (Vocal)
4 = Back from the Past: Jeff Scott Soto (Vocal), Ron Bumblefoot Thal (Guitar)
5 = Revel in Time: Brandon Yeagley (Vocal), Adrian Vandenberg (Guitar)
6 = The Year of ’41: Joe Lynn Turner (Vocal), Will Shaw (Vocals), Joel Hoekstra (Guitar), Jens Johansson (Keyboards)
7 = Bridge of Life: Damian Wilson (Vocal)
8 = Today is Yesterday: Dan Swanö (Vocal), Lisa Bella Donna (Keyboards), Marcel Singor (Guitar)
9 = A Hand on the Clock: Floor Jansen (Vocal), Joost van den Broek (Keyboards)
10 = Beyond the Edge of it All: John Jaycee Cuijpers (Vocal), Arjen Lucassen (Guitar)
11 = Lost Children of the Universe: Roy Khan (Vocal), Hellscore Choir (Vocals), Steve Vai (Guitar) | |
