Illuminata – Where stories unfold

“Where stories unfold” is the third album from Austrian band Illuminata.  They released their debut EP, “Lachrymal” in 2007 and in 2008 followed it with their debut album, “From the Chalice of Dreams”.  In late 2011 they released their second album “A World So Cold”.  Now at the start of 2015 their third album has just been released.
It’s certainly an ambitious album – the orchestral parts were recorded with a 60 piece orchestra, the Czech film orchestra – the orchestra that performed the soundtrack for season 2 of Game of Thrones.  The name of the orchestra is also rather apt since the music here resembles a film soundtrack with it’s epic sound.  For a small band to come out with an album of this quality is an amazing feat – the complexity in writing and then producing the orchestral score is immense and also expensive.

So the orchestrations are some of the most impressive I’ve heard on an album, but what about the rest of it – the metal band and the vocals?  Well they’re excellent too.  Katarzyna has a great voice and puts in an excellent performance, whether its doing the high operatic parts or the clean rock style vocals.  The band put in a good performance too, with the drumming being the most noticeable.  The guitars are used less – at times you don’t hear them at all but at other times there’s a nice heavy guitar sound, showing that the orchestra isn’t just bolted on behind the band’s sound, but is an integral part, so at times the eletric guitars are prominent but when they fade away the orchestra takes over.

It’s a superb album – and in fact one of the first things I did after listening to it for this review was to order myself a copy.  Highly recommended for fans of symphonic metal.

Track listing:

1. A Story Unfolds
2. Eternity Of Today
3. Violets Compass
4. Arbitrary Asylum
5. White Heart
6. Phoenix
7. The Brass Ring
8. Entwined
9. Danse Macabre
10. The Phantom Rickshaw
11. The World Constructor

Illuminata are:

Katarzyna – Lead Vocals, German Flute
Sabrina – Keys, Vocals
Luki – Electric and Acoustic Guitars
Christoph – Bass, Acoustic Guitars
Tom – Drums, Percussion

www.illuminata.at