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In de nog steeds toenemende stroom van neoklassieke progmetal heb ik een nieuwe naam ontdekt: Seven Seraphim. Dit Amerikaanse kwartet, onder aanvoering van de nieuwe gitaargod Andrew Szucs, maakt muziek die voornamelijk lijkt te zijn ingegeven door Yngwie Malmsteen en in mindere mate door Rainbow. De achtergrondinformatie is zeer beperkt en de band heeft kennelijk ook nog geen eigen website.

SBB are the godfathers of Polish progressive rock music and most prog heads know this band at least by name. Almost forty years in the business, bass player, keyboardist and singer Józef Skrzek and guitarist-keyboardist Apostolis Anthimos are still from the original line-up. Between the two of them all keyboard duties are divided. Drummer Gabor Nemeth completes the current line-up.

Drummer Wojtek Szadkowski is the mastermind of the Polish band Satellite. He also used to play an important role in his former band Collage. Nostalgia is the fourth album by Satellite. It is the successor of the recommended album Into The NIght (2007).

Janet Robbins belongs to the category of intriguing musicians you can’t put a definitive label on. Influenced by a wide range of musicians like Kate Bush and Peter Gabriel - just to name a few - and undoubtedly her father Marty Robbins. He probably has stimulated her to pick up a guitar. Robbins creates a musical style ranging from ambient to minimal music and from new age to slightly symphonic.

We have a new musical genre here! It’s called gospel progressive metal, but you probably think: I’ve heard music in the same vein before (Kerry Livgren’s AD perhaps?) and you are probably right. From my point of view, Revelation Project is the first release I came across, that tries to combine ‘spreading the gospel’ on music we could easily classify as progressive rock, although sometimes it sounds more like melodic metal and also some beautiful symphonic pieces like Promise have been included.

The American hard rock or melodic metal outfit Queensrÿche needs no introduction. Their magnum opus Operation: Mindcrime (1988) is a very popular album amongst both hard rock fans and fans of progressive rock music with a harder edge. This time Geoff Tate and his bandmates got their inspiration from Tate's father who used to be a professional military man. As many of them, who witnessed the horrors of war, he never opened up to his son Geoff until a few years ago.

Product is a Los Angeles based American duo consisting of Arman Christoff Boyles (vocals, keyboards, guitars) and Scott Rader (drums, bass, background vocals). With Earth (2008) they complete their quadrilogy on the four elements: On Water (2000), Aire (2003) and The Fire (2005). The lyrics are inspired by the life of Nikola Tesla, a scientist who played an important role in the development of transmissible energy (AC current). Tesla came to New York as a foreigner.

The history from Praying Mantis goes back to 1977 when the Spanish-Greek brothers Tino Troy (guitar, vocals, keyboards) and Chris Troy (bass, guitar, vocals, keyboards) founded the band. From 1990 Dennis Stratton (ex-Iron Maiden, guitar, vocals) is considered to be a full member of the band as well. As a successor to the commercially succesful album Nowhere To Hide (2000) the decision was made to use different vocalists.

Mike Portnoy, the human drum machine of Dream Theater, Transatlantic and Neal Morse Band needs no introduction and he ranks amongst the greatest rock drummers of his time. In the footsteps of celebrities like Neil Peart (Rush), Bill Bruford (ex-Yes) and Terry Bozzio (ex-UK), he strikes the most complex patterns and he amazes friend and foe with his physical ability to keep on going for three hours or more.

Reflection is the debut album by the Belgian prog metal band Panopticum. Having listened to the album numerous times and having seen the band live at Progfarm in November 2005, there are some remarks to be made. Firstly the production is not state of the art, but it has the quality of a fairly good demo. There's not much depth in guitar sounds and muffled drum sounds. Nor live, nor on the record vocalist Shari managed to impress me.