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Ah, one of my favorite bands returns with a killer album. For those of you who are new onto Concerto Moon, they are a melodic metal Japanese band. They had released four previous albums: "Fragments of the Moon" (1997), "From Father To Son" (1998), "Rain Forest" (1999) and "The End of Beginning" (live album, 2000). The best thing about Concerto Moon is their guitar player: An axe wizard named Norifumi Shima. This guy sounds like Yngwie Malmsteen himself. I bet that Norifumi could play in an Yngwie album and people would not notice the difference. Norifumi has also a side project called Double Dealer where he teams up with vocalist Takenori Shimoyama, main vocalist of Saber Tiger (another and famous Japanese act). But is in Concerto Moon that he puts all his passion. Another key of Concerto Moon is their keyboard player, Toshiyuki Koike, a guy who has confessed that his idol is Andre Andersen (keys-maestro and mastermind behind Royal Hunt).

Concerto Moon music can be described as a mix of Yngwie Malmsteen styled music mixed in with 80’s traditional metal. The vocalist reminds me a lot of Munetaka Higushi, singer of Loudness (yep, another great Japanese metal act). On "Gate of Triumph", they have not changed their formula. By featuring more instrumental tracks than on their previous albums, now Norifumi made sure that all his skills are the main show. As you may expect, the guitar solos are just mind-blowing and the melodies out of this world.

It is very difficult for me to review an album from one of my favorite bands, and one of the best metal acts in the world in my opinion. So to keep it short, I strongly recommend you to grab any album by Concerto Moon. Once you listen to them they will grab your soul and will not let you tear apart. You have no idea what you are missing. Exactly this happened to me 2 years ago and I am very, very grateful to the person who made me discover Concerto Moon.