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What happened?!? After the masterpiece that was their previous album, Conception deliver their final album Flow, and to me, the result is a disappointment. The thing that makes this album inferior to the rest of the discography is that they changed their style completely. Starting with the compositions themselves: they are not as good as I know the band is capable of doing. However, there is some killer stuff here like the opener "Gethsemane", "Tell me when I'm Gone" and the title track.

The performances are good here but I have major issues with Roy Khan. Not because he sounds bad, far from it, but because he uses a lot of vocal effects. And they are horrible; there is no other way to say it, just listen to "A Virtual Lovestory" and you'll know what I am talking about. When he gets rid of that shit and sings properly like in "Cry" and "Hold On" the man sounds awesome. Guitarist Tore Østby shines as always, but he doesn't completely rule the album like in previous works. The exception to that are in "Would It Be The Same" and the Japanese bonus track "Hand on Heart". The rhythm session by Ingar Amlien (bass) and Arve Heimdal (drums) gets the job done but that is not a surprise.

The bottom line is that Flow is Conception's worst album as there was only one direction to go and it wasn't up. While the record gets better with each listen, it doesn't have the same punch that their previous albums had. Having said that, this is a worthy album to have especially for Progressive Power Metal fans, thus ending the chapter of one of the best metal bands to ever come out of Norway.