It has been two years since Imperia released debut album The Ancient Dance Of Qetesh. A lot has happened since then for singer and driving force of the band Helena Iren Michaelsen. She gave birth to a daughter, which she appropriately called Angel like her solo-project. Due to personal issues she moved back to native country Norway. All of these things affected her life of course profoundly, something which you can clearly hear on this new release Queen of Light.

 

This kind of metal is larded of emotions anyway, so the good and bad things that happened to misses Michaelsen surely added an extra dimension. If you listen carefully to the lyrics of 'Broken Wings' and 'The Calling' it is not really difficult to figure out what personal issues troubled her the last few years.
 

At least she managed to gather a steady line up for Imperia. And this time new guitarist Jan Yrlund has written most of the music. It is probably why the album has much more variety than its predecessor. Perhaps this album will attract a larger audience. Because the music reminds me a lot of similar acts like After Forever and Within Temptation.

But to be honest if this isn’t really your kind of thing, you might get easily bored. This album is for people who really dig this kind of music. Imperia is not about to take over the torch of the aforementioned bands. They are on the right way, though. I already wonder what the next album is going to sound like.