Star One
Space Metal

Not content with releasing concept albums all more or less at the same high level, both in terms of compositional and instrumental quality, mostly all double albums, the versatile Arjen Lucassen has immersed himself in a number of side projects, some of which have been very successful, such as the Star One reviewed here, while others were a bit lackluster like Stream of Passion, Ambeon, or the more recent Guilt Machine.

The Star One project was born in 2002 from a failed collaboration between Lucassen and Bruce Dickinson of Iron Maiden, who preferred to leave due to managerial problems. Lucassen found himself with a lot of material and decided to release it anyway, with the help of other musicians and singers.

The lineup of Star One is excellent: besides the exceptional Lucassen, guitarist, bassist, and keyboardist, there is the usual array of guests, actually smaller than usual compared to the Ayreon sphere, which includes the usual faithful Ed Warby of Gorefest on drums and a handful of brilliant vocalists. The most refined voice is that of Damian Wilson, a superb singer, previously present in "Into The Electric Castle" in the "role" of the medieval knight, also a singer of Threshold and Landmarq, while Russell Allen of Symphony X is the most impactful singer; the more choral female parts are entrusted to the beautiful and talented Dutch Floor Jansen, singer of After Forever. The Swedish multi-instrumentalist and musical mercenary Dan Swanö (he has played with Unicorn, Edge of Sanity, Diabolical Masquerade, Bloodbath, Nightingale, Infestdead, Godsend, Katatonia, Karaboudjan) also sings some parts. Finally, Gary Wehrkamp of Shadow Gallery participates, rounding out the guitar sound with his unmistakable style in solos.

The sounds of "Space Metal" are generally very close to the Ayreon style, especially with regard to the keyboard elements in the way of associating synthesizers and organ with electric guitars, although the project is generally more influenced by '70s metal and space rock than by prog-metal. There are a couple of unusually oriental episodes ("Sandrider" and "The Eye of Ra"), excellent melodic moments ("Perfect Survivor", but especially "Songs From The Ocean") even if undoubtedly the best is represented by the excellent space metal parts, such as "High Moon", "Set Your Controls", "Starchild" and "Master Of Darkness". The compositions are all very special, with vocals featuring original melodic lines, particularly the parts of Floor Jansen who interprets them magnificently.

Even the themes concerning space and science fiction are very close to the Ayreon project, although distant from the fantasy world created by Lucassen dominated by humans and "Forever", but inspired by space-themed films and fiction: Outland ("High Moon"), The Empire Strikes Back ("Master Of Darkness"), Stargate ("The Eye Of Ra"), Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home ("Songs From The Ocean"), Dune ("Sandrider"), Alien ("Perfect Survivor"), Blake's 7 ("Intergalactic Space Crusaders"), 2001: A Space Odyssey ("Starchild").  In this sense, the title of the album and also the cover could not have been chosen better.

There is also a limited edition, with a sensational Hawkwind Medley featuring Dave Brock from the same Hawkwind, a couple of unreleased tracks ("Spaced Out" inspired by Dark Star; "Inseparable Enemies", inspired by My Enemy), a mediocre cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity" and a more amusing cover of Donovan's "Intergalactic Laxative".

Perhaps this is Arjen Anthony Lucassen's most inspired side project, sealed by an excellent live, Live On Earth. However, Lucassen has stated that he is unable to recreate an atmosphere similar to "Space Metal" and therefore has virtually closed with Star One, although in more recent interviews he has instead declared himself undecided whether to give a sequel to this project or not. Certainly "Space Metal" was the result of a great musical and compositional moment.