suggestions for next album

[AAAAAAAAAA]

After many more listens, I can definitely say that Polaris was a great album. Even by Stratovarius standards, which are quite high.

I'm sure there are already some plans for the next one, so I thought maybe the fans could make some suggestions on some elements they want to keep from Polaris and some things that could be improved.

Things To Keep
1) I like the fact that multiple people from the band contributed to the songwriting of the album, really added to the variety

2) The keyboard influence is nice. Both the solos and also in slower sections of songs like "blind".

3) The artwork is great. Don't keep the artwork for the next album But the artist did a nice job!

4) The production is excellent, as we expect

5) Good mix of ballads/slow songs with faster ones...keeps the listener interested

Things to Fix
1) Less cheesy riffs (ie, the beginning of 'Forever is Today'). It just doesn't sound natural to me, almost like Dragonforce.

2) I don't mind the positive message, but does it have to be so blatant? "I WILL WASTE NO MORE TIME! LEAVE MY WORRIES BEHIND!" Come on, if I wanted that kind of thing I'd listen to "Hannah Montana". This is a metal band, I like the lyrics to be inspirational and the message to be positive but I would prefer it to be more subtle.

3) I loved the guitars on Polaris but I wish they were a lot heavier and crunchier. The solos were good- I wish there were even more.

4) While Kotipelto's singing is very good on this album technically, the vocal lines in Polaris are definitely the weak point. It just doesn't sound natural. I'm not sure what the solution is to this, but for instance the vocal lines on Kotipelto's solo albums sound much more relaxed and natural, the singing on Polaris sounds really forced.

5) Accent. I find it funny that mainly Finnish people complain about Kotipelto's accent (and south americans) while native speakers seem to have no problem with it. But in this case I think, his accent did interfere with some songs. Especially "When Mountains Fall". Not a big problem though.

6) Lyrics...are really an atrocity. I'm sorry but there is no other way to put it. The lyrics on "blind" in particular, make me cringe every time. Who wrote the line "But I'm trying to erase you from my brain"!?? Its just....not...right...so I really hope more attention is paid to the lyrics on the next album. It doesn't have to be robert frost material, but just enough attention should be paid to it so it does not distract the listener with its cheesiness.

7) Don't squeeze in so many words in a short amount of time on songs like Deep Unknown. "As you go" for instance annoys me on that. Same with "You will find". I mean, instead of "you will find", why not just say "find?" it would make more sense to me.

[Ragehead91]

I agree with everything but the Keyboard part.
MORE GUITAR AND LESS KEYBOARD!

[icecab21]

A suggestion for AAAAAAAAAA, make your own album, it let's you do what you want. Some of your list sounds a little more like personal demands than constructive criticism and suggestions. Other from that I’m sure the band will thank you for opening their eyes to the errors of their ways. May they be blessed to please you more on the next one.

[Aldaron]

Very well thought out A10, and pretty much on the money. I agree with just about everything, but I was ok with Timo's vocals. They weren't his best, (you're right - solo stuff was better), but they were adequate. The accent didn't bother me but than I'm a native English speaker, so your theory holds true - not sure why, but it does.

As for the lyrics, I didn't think they were atrocious, but they could definitely use a little more depth and originality. (I must say, I frequently think TT failed in that respect as well, but let's not go there in this thread).

Loved the keyboards on Polaris, but definitely want MORE guitar - yea, and crunchy too.



Good Heavens, icecab, I thought you were the ultimate defender of personal opinions. You've said it enough. Of course everyone is going to say what would please them most. That's what the thread is about. We're not composers, most of us, just listeners who have opinions on what they like. The band will take it or leave it, I'm sure.

[Bublix]

I agree with AAAAA, that vocals sounds quite forced. I prefer Kotipelto´s voice on Cain´s Offering samples than on Polaris. The lyrics are quite predicteble sometimes, but.. that happens

Personally I´d like to hear DeepUnknown/FallingStar-like album next time. Or something less traditional But the second Polaris would be nice too...

[icecab21]

AAAAAAAAA was rather arrogant about it though. Saying things like "the listener", I mean that makes it seem like he thinks he represents everyone or matters more. Calling someone’s work cheesy is being an elitist asshole, it’s not giving reasonable suggestions.

[AAAAAAAAAA]

A suggestion for AAAAAAAAAA, make your own album, it let's you do what you want. Some of your list sounds a little more like personal demands than constructive criticism and suggestions. Other from that I’m sure the band will thank you for opening their eyes to the errors of their ways. May they be blessed to please you more on the next one.

I understand you are still reeling from the countless verbal thrashings you received at my hands here at the Stratoforum. Therefore I will gracefully accept your harsh and oddly worded criticisms, if it will even the score and settle your nerves.

As far as making my own album, I plan to. I have two important musical offers pending at the moment. One is to join your band, where we can continue making midi's using only one piano tone, which we can put on our personal myspace page, complete with an ugly wallpaper and three skanky looking friends. The other option is to join you and hiro's internationally renowned supergroup. Rumor has it, you have a world class recording studio in your home. I believe it was somewhere in your parent's bedroom? We'll have to be quiet when they're sleeping but no problem; we can just record when they go to work.

I'll trust you to take care of the lyrics though; I hear metal fans are rather impassive towards punctuation. Although I must say you seem to have improved! Next week we'll learn about the colon: and the semicolon; it would have really helped you in sentence #1. Also, "other from that" is not a valid english expression. But we'll take it one step at a time!

[icecab21]

I hope you are being ironic with that last paragraph since it’s filled with things your Internet grammar Nazi self should criticize. Starting a sentence with “but” is not exactly the most formal of English either.

[Inventariado]

MORE GUITAR AND LESS KEYBOARD![/size][/b]

I would put it with caps lock on, but I'd rather be soft because it's just my opinion= More guitars would be probably nice. Less keyboards... Not a chance!

I would only say about Polaris that drums are a bit lower in the mix than the previous albums, I miss that, hope in the future ones Jörg strikes back

[Aldaron]

I hope you are being ironic with that last paragraph since it’s filled with things your Internet grammar Nazi self should criticize. Starting a sentence with “but” is not exactly the most formal of English either.

Yea, but it isn't technically wrong either. Of course, he did end a sentence with a preposition too. Tsk, tsk.

[icecab21]

A instrumental on the next album is something that I would like.

[AAAAAAAAAA]

I hope you are being ironic with that last paragraph since it’s filled with things your Internet grammar Nazi self should criticize. Starting a sentence with “but” is not exactly the most formal of English either.

Yea, but it isn't technically wrong either. Of course, he did end a sentence with a preposition too. Tsk, tsk.

Well, when you get to my level, you make your own rules
I'm kidding of course, but I'm actually more concerned with how a paragraph flows, even at the expense of perfect grammar. A writing style which is easy to read, or creative, or expressive in some way (for instance, resembling the tone of a regular conversation) is more important than obeying every little convention.

I never take english classes, its boring as hell

[NeverendingAbyss]

I personally don't know what to expect from the next album. I hold true that Polaris was an experiment to see which path to steer. You see some inspirational messages just like TT used to do, as well as darker lyrics (just a bit).
My suggestion: Keep experimenting the new music but not in an official album. That way you will have the right amount of salt to the recipe!

[icecab21]

A 30 minute song would be interesting.

[browneyedgirl]

A 30 minute song would be interesting.

Like, "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida" by Iron Butterfly? Oh, I think that song was about 17 minutes long, but its a classic, espessically with us hippie types!
Yeah, it can be done especially if there is a 10 minute guitar, drum or keyboard solo in the middle.

I guess you were kidding, right, icecab?

[icecab21]

I think Jens said the matius had written a song longer than 30 minutes. I think That would make an interesting bonus track. With all the prog bands that have 3-4 song albums with songs that are 10-30 minutes long, I guess it would just be interesting to hear stratovarius do a huge multiple storyline song. Thinking about the big epics that the prog bands put out, I would say that breaking the song up into parts is what I prefer. Some of these songs have my favorite parts like 9 minutes in so I have to cut them into smaller pieces.

[mayhem-for-all]

I think Jens said the matius had written a song longer than 30 minutes. I think That would make an interesting bonus track. With all the prog bands that have 3-4 song albums with songs that are 10-30 minutes long, I guess it would just be interesting to hear stratovarius do a huge multiple storyline song. Thinking about the big epics that the prog bands put out, I would say that breaking the song up into parts is what I prefer. Some of these songs have my favorite parts like 9 minutes in so I have to cut them into smaller pieces.

Yeah that was true he really said matias had that song.

E: Oh and one thing I would like to point out is that this time around they are not hurrying.
They have no rush in composing.
They have already composed for a good time so I think this time the musuic will be more ready and how to say it "Hiottu".
I hope they will bump into the studio after the tour early next year.
One more thing. Jens said there is so much material coming but the record company doesn't want them to do a double album.
I think they should make two albums at once like with elements.
This time they don't have to be connected even though they would be twins.
They could just tour release the first early and the second later.
then record a normal record in 2011 again

[RazielSR]

I like this kind of topics. I think it helps a bit to the composer. You know, they are gonna do thrie songs and their thoughts, etc, etc, but I think it's always good for them to see what the fans think about their songs.

For the next album I'd like to have more long guitar solos, and more melodic. I like a lot the new semi-prog influence that Matias brings to the band (and Jens now having more participation) but I miss some really melodic solos. I'd like to listen some epic-long song too. Well, we have Emancipation but I don't like the song divided in two tracks. That should be imo, one track. But please, do not lose the semi-prog influence, it is fresh and good for the band.

Then we have Tk's voice. Now that I have listened to the album a lot, I miss his old high notes. In Gather the Faithful he sings higher and I like it more like this.

About the keyboards, I don't have a problem with having a lot of keyboards if it's Jens playing. But they need to add some more guitars, yes.

I don't want love songs. At least not the typical love story...as I said I don't like the lyrics in Somehow precious, but I like a lot all the rest.


Of course this is just our thoughts and some fans opinions, but this topics are constructive.
They are the artists and should make the next album based in their thoughts, not in our opinions, but I think it helps.

[icecab21]

Try to add "icecab21" in the lyrics as much as you can. Vocal runs with vowels such as AAAAAAAAAA would be cool. A vocal run with a consonants such as XXXXXXXXXX would be even cooler. Keep it exciting so listeners don’t go ZZZZZZZZZZ.

[RazielSR]

Ode to icecab21 ftw!

[Intiaani]

XXXXXXXXX... Yeah, pretty psychedelic, might even be ground breaking stuff. I don't think even Frank Zappa did that!

Anyway, what I'd like to suggest for the new album: let the band do what they want, screw every single suggestion the fans tell you to do and do your own thing.

[palarmux]

I agree with everything but the Keyboard part.
MORE GUITAR AND LESS KEYBOARD!

Heh heh rage You have sayed that many times and I agreed 100% that. More quitar less keyboard. It is not perfect album But I love it

[icecab21]

Make a no strings attached album with just layer upon layer of keyboards.

More classical elements and epic elements. The big three of harpsichord, choir, and strings.

Make a album full of brass ones

[Lurdi]

Yes, I do also miss a really really Stratovarius epic song such as Destiny, Eternity, Visions, Infinity...
I don't like those direct love songs, I'd like them to be a lot more elaborated for everyone to interpret them. For instance, there is nothing to interpret in the song Somehow Precious. Its lyrics seem pretty simple to me.
I mean, if you want to say you are missing someone, you feel sad or I don't know, you are in love, whatever, don't say it literally.
This is for instance a wonderful way to say, well, that you love a person, you are missing him/her, cannot live without him/her:

Without you I'm like
A ship without its sails
Calling the wind to save me
I'd climb the highest mountain
I'd cross the seven seas
Just to see your smile again

And more guitar
More high notes

[icecab21]

Make a pirate metal album full of hooks.

[hiro23]

Well according to what Jens has been saying most of the material for the next album has already been written, so we will just have to see what stuff they've been working on once the songs are released.

[Lurdi]

Well according to what Jens has been saying most of the material for the next album has already been written, so we will just have to see what stuff they've been working on once the songs are released.

Obvious hiro

[hiro23]

Am I getting that predictable already? I might have to throw something out of left field

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[Ragehead91]

What the fuck is wrong with you Icecab? This topic is about is stating our opinions on what should be changed for the next studio album. We have the right to say our opinion. No need to turn this into a spam thread. That's not called for here. I don't see why you get so easily offended by stuff like this. There is nothing wrong with what Ax10 says in the first post. And I reapeat it again, there are more opinions then "I like everything!" and you don't have to be musician to be music critic.

[icecab21]

I put normal things in here too. You guys can’t honestly be serious about this type of thread.

AAAAAAAAAA calls the bands riffs cheesy and their lyrics atrocious. I don't think the band went “hey, let’s play this cheesy riff". I assume the band liked it and that is why they played it. It is not being a critic of music if you call something cheesy, it is not professional or respectable at all
.

Lyrics...are really an atrocity.

just enough attention should be paid to it so it does not distract the listener with its cheesiness.

Come on, if I wanted that kind of thing I'd listen to "Hannah Montana".

Less cheesy riffs (ie, the beginning of 'Forever is Today'). It just doesn't sound natural to me, almost like Dragonforce.

You really think he is being a normal respectable person by saying things like this?

Forever we today has a riff similar to what metal bands have been playing for over 30 years. I don't see how it gets compared to a band that first released a cd in 2003