Review of the Album "Imaginations From the Other Side" by German Power and Speed Metal Band Blind Guardian

German speed and power metal band Blind Guardian has always impressed me with their riffs, melodies, power, and the harsh vocals of Hansi Kursch. Their 1995 album called "Imaginations From the Other Side" follows their solid 1992 album called Somewhere Far Beyond. Lyrically, the band has not changed a great deal but the lyrical concepts in this album tend to deal with stories about King Arthur and Camelot. The first song which is the title track is of power metal style and slowed down (think about Brazilian power metal band Angra). By this point in the band’s career, the vocals of Hansi are both sort of rough and melodic as well. One user on YouTube says that this is Blind Guardian’s best album. Is it really that good?

The band certainly has evolved into a power metal and sometimes progressive band after being like thrash metal in their first three albums. By this point, Blind Guardian’s best albums were its first four, a similarity that they share with Metallica.

By the second song called I’m Alive, the speed, power, and melody are back in full force as guitarist Andre Olbrich uses his melody style to make things better in the song. In 1998, he would showcase his melodic talents even more. He adds some creative acoustic guitar which isn’t totally modern but not too old either.

We should put Blind Guardian in a top 5 list of best German metal bands of all time along with Scorpions, Kreator, Tankard, and Holy Moses. This list of course is not in any particular order as all these bands are great in their own way.

This second song is about a long distance runner that gets to the end of the race, yet he is exhausted and he feels that his dreams are over. All that effort that he put in to get to the top seems to have been in vain. The system in some countries has failed the population and as a result, they are suffering with lost hopes and dreams and that is another message that the song tries to bring up. But as long as we are alive, healthy and have hope, our dreams may still be achieved even if we have to work harder for them.

The ballad song called A Past and Future Secret is similar with its acoustic guitar play to the song Lord of the Rings on the band’s 3^rd album. This is a good way for the band to show their versatility. The Script for My Requiem is a hybrid between power and thrash metal with symphonic elements. The song is about a person that was born during the Middle Ages and his goal was to find his holy grail or the top objective that he wanted to reach in this holy land. The song called Born In a Mourning Hall is a melodic song about someone who is born into this world with what is called growing pains as the shadow of their fears haunts them. The song is still fast so Blind Guardian did not really slow down their tempo until the album Nightfall in Middle Earth. The song Another Holy War is a song telling others that there is a god that will bring freedom back to people’s hearts. This god’s words have the power to bring freedom and salvation to men. Could this song be about Jesus? That’s a good possibility. I wonder why there are the words Holy War in this song. The song’s title is misleading but the song is good with Andre Olbrich’s melodic play making this a very creative song. Overall, Imaginations From the Other Side is not quite Blind Guardian’s best album but it is still quite good and it still maintains the speed and thrash metal of their 1980’s albums. We will probably give this album a solid and respectable 85 points out of 100.