Spent the last week binging the Sonata Arctica discography, from Ecliptica through Talviyö. Wrapping up Talviyö's third spin right now actually.
Ecliptica through Reckoning Night is one of the best runs of power metal the style has ever seen. Winterheart is my favorite SA album and my #3 all-time favorite record, but the rest are just fantastic. Very very little to nitpick here, as that's all I have, nitpicks, songs like Last Drop Falls and how Silence is just a bit too long, blah blah. Amazing all around.
Unia and The Days of Grays are probably my #2 and #3 Sonata albums for good having listened to so much Sonata. Like, I've heard every album countless times (except the most recent two), but this just drove home how phenomenal those albums are in my opinion. I admire the experimentation, creativity, wild and spellbinding vibe of all the songs. TDOG gets dangerously close to being too Nightwish-y with the orchestral parts in Juliet and The Last Amazing Grays, but it never goes overboard. Some of Tony's best lyrics ever are on these albums, imo.
Stones Grow Her Name is the last 'amazing' Sonata album imo. I think that album gets soooo much undeserved hate from fans. Other than Don't Be Mean, I really don't have anything to complain about. I love this album to death.
Pariah's Child hasn't aged well for me. Some songs are good, but there seems to be a scarcity of momentum of truly inspired songwriting. The return to the old logo is really misleading considering songs like Running Lights are almost completely devoid of that old power metal sound apart from some fast drums and that strong, melodic hook. Tony starts to sound like he's phoning in some of his vocals. Larger Than Life remains one of the band's best ever songs. I started to sour on the idea of listening to SA albums repeatedly at this point - this album gets tedious very fast.
The Ninth Hour - I did not enjoy revisiting this more than once, and even the first time was more than enough. I like it more than I used to, but that's not saying much. Candle Lawns and On The Faultline remain my favorites, easily. Even the faster stuff sounds phoned in and uninteresting and uninspired to me. God, the guitar work in Sonata after Jani left is just miserable, but especially after Stones. Elias has the easiest guitar job in metal next to Emppu
Talviyö - just like TNH, I enjoy it more than I did when it came out, but after hearing this a few times, I'm almost annoyed that I listened to it so much. There is such a drastic drop-off in compelling songwriting after Stones, certainly after Pariah's Child, and this album just doensn't do it for me. And the last two songs being painfully long is just the worst. I just don't really like this or The Ninth Hour, and I don't see that changing at all for a very long time, like until my musical taste does some drastic shift and I revisit these as an old man.
Just my two cents (or more...), felt like getting that out there after spending all week with the band.