Pelata O Gods of Metal, I humbly bow and beg for thy forgiveness. I have been ignorant too long. I had heard thy decree that After Forever was indeed amazing and blessed by thee, but I ignored thy voices. Forgive me, O spiked and studded ones. Forgive me, for as thou hast said, After Forever is the ultimate reigning ruler of the Operatic Metal Realms.

Floor Jensen is most fully blessed by thy hands, as her voice is the uttermost superior of any so-called ‘opera’ singers within thy gates. Her majestic, rich, soulful strains utterly demolish any other singers in her most worthy path. The mighty warriors you have placed at her side certainly bear your mark and seal and regal kings within their appointed dominions. Their newest offering Invisible Circles is truly and unequivocally your Metallic Will for all within the Operatic Metal Realms to bear witness to and allow to saturate their aural senses. Send forth ‘Digital Deceit’, ‘Blind Pain’, & ‘Beautiful Emptiness’ into their very souls and engulf them in thy Blinding Glory! Forgive, O Metal Ones, do not smite me! In return, I vow to tell all who will listen about thy servant After Forever. I will expel my dying breath declaring their superiority and ultimate, everlasting’.uh’kick-ass-ness to the masses.

Hear me, O minions of the Operatic Metal Realms! Deny your false idols and worship the Gods of Metal at the altar of After Forever!

bonnek Hot on the heels of The Gathering, countless countries started assembling female-fronted metal bands. Holland alone already sprouted two big ones Within Temptation and After Forever, which both took the powerful singing style of Anneke Van Giersbergen on The Gathering's Mandylion into operatic and gothic directions.

After Forever started with a very uneven debut, but followed it up with two solid releases of which the third is probably the best and certainly the one with the highest prog-metal cards. The album flows without dips in the songwriting and has enough hooks to make each piece memorable. Floor Jansen is an excellent singer in this style. Her commanding voice is never shrill, her melodies never hesitant or trite. There's also a male grunter, a cliché of the genre and quite annoying here, as he is as inexpressive and tuneless as Floor is passionate and melodious.

A solid album in a style I quickly got tired of, but if you like Epica, Ayreon, Nightwish, Within Temptation or Therion, this album is worth checking out. Although I'd rather recommend you to go for the real thing and try the Gathering's Mandylion and Nightime Birds or the more experimental band Madder Mortem.

Vobiscum After the departure of "Mark Jansen," a new chapter has been done to the band. He along with "Floor Jansen" were the main songwriters. The challenge would be to release an album that lives up to the previous two did, but unfortunately they failed ... It was not for lack of trying. "Bas Maas" joined the band, thus taking away the guitar left by "Mark".

A concept album, an immense challenge for a newly structured band. A reduction in coral and a significant increase in the base guitar, abandoning the Gothic vein to something more "metal" had begun.

With more elaborate arrangements and many times more cracked, the band has allowed a more focused sound to the "Prog".

The album talks about the work above family, abandonment and how it affects the life of a child born in a home without attention, affection ... A novelty was the inclusion of a clear male voice ("Bas Maas") to add to the voices of "Floor Jansen - female soprano vocals" and "Sander Gommans - grunts".

The biggest highlight is the "Floor Jansen" that switches the timbre of his voice according to the change of characters. In it I would not see another musician who has been recognized.

In "Between Love & Fire" is the encounter of the three vocal highlight of the album.

The slow "Eccentric" is a beautiful song but far from the best of the band.

Not all tracks have the same quality, pleasing some and it makes very little difference in the end, because if the idea, the concept is very good, otherwise the level of implementation of the idea, we did not have the same result.

The musicians seem very simplistic, as if it were not allowed to dare.

"Blind Pain" is the track most "Prog" disk.

In short the album is interesting to hear because of the proposal even though the result was not so good. Clearly the potential for "Floor Jansen" as a singer, lyricist, composer.