Imperium
Dreamhunter

Imperium is a project by Finnish musician Mika Brushane who might be best known as a drummer of the band Strike. This is a project he has been working with for quite a while and he has enlisted the help of some prominent people. There are three singers on this album and some other skilled musicians that help Mika who does the drums, keys and bass along with some backing vocals on this album that is the debut of this project. It has an exciting looking artwork so lets see if there is some exciting looking music behind that artwork.

Musically it isn’t really that exciting, it is a nod back in time when melodic hardrock ruled the world. It is excellently produced, the soundscape is as good as they come and the vocalists are all very strong. I would describe this as a quality production and as the variation is fairly good you will probably also be able to stand the playing time that is just over fifty minutes on eleven tracks. Melodic hardrock or AOR, quite in accordance with what is usually released on the AOR Heaven label, no surprises there and fans of the genre might find it agreeable as it certainly is made really well.

One could argue that the lack of originality is something working against this album and one would be quite correct in that argument, at the same time that is what people want most of the time – very few people seem to grow tired with hearing the same stuff over and over. But originality is just one piece of the puzzle of a new album and the other piece of that puzzle they lay out really well. The songs on this album are all very strong and I think that I cannot conclude anything but saying that this is a great album despite it shortcomings in the creative department.

So it may not be interesting in a creative sense but as a piece of music to enjoy it works really well with 80’s Love Song and Always Forever as the highlights of this album with really strong songs. I like it and don’t really doubt that you probably will do so as well; therefore I can recommend this album as Imperium really hits the right buttons with this first album. I think you should have a look at it.

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