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AFM Records is definitely THE power metal label and knows who to sign, as they don't really have any "crap" bands on their roaster. A relatively new entry to the power metal genre, Nostradameus might not bring much more to the genre, but what they do, they do it very well. The highlight on this album are definitely the vocals, very clear, very well controlled in low and high notes alike. There are some "choir" chants here and there that are well done as well.

The music is pretty much what you'd expect from a power metal band: Somewhat happy-sounding, double bass drums used at will, catchy solos (very catchy :)). I'd say their sound reminds me a little bit of Gamma Ray. Some songs that stand apart are "Nightmare Prophecy" with a lot of tempo changes and some great vocals and very catchy solos, "Without Your Love", an excellent power ballad, "Master of the Night" is one of the fastest and catchiest songs on the album, and the closer "One For All, All For One", a very catchy hymn. The short intro "Words of Nostradameus" is also worthy of mention. Ok with all that said, I guess the common feature here is "catchy", which is what this album is. The songs will keep coming back into your head, forcing you to pop that one into your CD player pretty often. I can't really pick a bad song on the album, just some that are better than the others. I like that. :)

The production could be better, sometimes the choir vocals are lost under the instruments and at some other times it's the contrary - in both cases it doesn't seem to be what was intented. Still good overall. While Nostradameus doesn't really bring anything new here, in my opinion this release is much better than the average power metal release and they definitely deserve their place in the metal realm. If this is your type of music, do yourself a favor and check those guys out.