Sonata Arctica
Unia

THE REVIEW

What I am describing today is a sound suicide of rare spectacle.

Imagine a saturated genre: evoke in your mind a packed venue on a Friday evening, the A22 highway on a winter weekend, the line outside the cinema for the premiere of Shrek 17, and so on. There you are! In this musical genre, you turn around, and there are dozens and dozens of bands all alike, with a decent amount of technique under their belts and false hopes. Everyone has the same goal: trying to break into the record market and thus having the possibility (but not the certainty) of taking off, if not making it big.

Sonata Arctica are part of the "cunning bands" of this genre as saturated as the arteries of a chronic obese person. It's not that I have it out for them, but it's a fact that the aforementioned band was shamelessly favored by their compatriots Stratovarius. Thanks to a good power metal album ("Ecliptica") with 0 innovation, endowed with much melodic appeal, they were catapulted with their mentors on a European tour that exposed them to a vast audience. The name circulates, they make a good impression, and since then our dear Sonata have begun to walk on their own legs. They even ran swiftly in the astonishing "Silence", trotted in "Winterheart's Guild", and jogged quite well, limping here and there (a little strain) in "Reckoning Night". Melodic, absolutely power, but still characteristic, in doing so, they managed to capture a nice chunk of the genre. In short, they made it!! Now they can live off their laurels, create albums with the same mold, become stereotyped, and maybe try to give birth to another quality album while waiting for Odin's inspiration. In 2007, they released their fifth album: "Unia".

In Finnish, it means dream. At my place, instead, it corresponds to an absolute disaster! A sound suicide, a musical abortion, a blow to the balls, an own goal in a World Cup final, a "I'm leaving you because I love you too much". A situation that leaves you stunned, with that aftertaste of being made fun of, making you say: really nice joke, but now give me the real CD!

The album was, of course, described by fans and critics as experimental "it's not bad, you just need to get into the right mindset as they are trying to find their sound" or with the amusing phrase "it's more difficult, but with time it gets into your head". A profusion of doubt statements like "If we take it as the start of a new course, from a certain point of view, it's genius". A leap into the future with the ever-green "in 10 years, you'll see, you will understand it". Then they stride confidently on the technical: "it has terrific production, you can crank up the volume to a thousand and the sound remains clean, and then the double vocals, Jani's guitar sound is dirtier and more beautiful, the tempo changes, etc...

Okay, well done everyone; you almost convinced me. Too bad my ears disagree! Maybe I should stop for a moment.

Q: "Excuse me, are you from around here? What the hell genre is this (ref. crank up the volume and let them listen to the single)??? I'm trying to find Unia, aka the musical dream, can you tell me the way? Sorry, you know, but I got lost at the crossroads between power and metal. Here in Finland, it’s cold and foggy... I know very well it's a genius work (everyone says so) and I'm a bit embarrassed because I've never gotten lost before as I've been listening to this music for years...
A: Well, it's very simple ... keep listening to it, and you'll see that out of exhaustion, it will get to you sooner or later, and then you'll find the way and the genre.
Q: Thank you, very kind!
A: You're welcome.

It seems to me that Sonata, in this gigantic musical dream, have succeeded in a titanic endeavor: ruining their honest career as a power metal band to veer towards a sound that means nothing. Prog??? Oh please, let's not blaspheme!!! I've heard this too, and you don't think that a pause within a mid-tempo means prog, do you?? Heavy?? Nah... too soft, not direct enough, and soporific as a whole.

Yes, I would say it definitely is a disaster, and I'm cold. It sounds a lot like an Arctic mess.