Warthur
With Thomen Stauch's past in Blind Guardian, it's no surprise that his power metal project Savage Circus should draw comparisons to the other band. Actually, I find this album a hell of a lot more fun than anything Blind Guardian have done for years. As fun as Blind Guardian's symphonic influences are, sometimes you want your Dungeons & Dragons metal to just keep it simple, and Savage Circus accomplishes that, opting for aggression and intensity over complexity and sophistication. It might be a little dependent on the Blind Guardian sound, but that doesn't mean the album is a pointless imitation of Thomen's old band: rather, you can see it as Thomen and his bandmates taking a chance to explore a musical direction which Blind Guardian themselves opted against. Fun for power metal fans, though if you aren't particularly excited by the Blind Guardian school of the subgenre it might lose its charm quickly.