Twelve years after «The Heart of the Matter», Triosphere return with their fourth album. «Oceans Above, Stars Below» came out on August 28 through Frontiers Records and brings the Norwegian band back with the same demand they always had: power metal with progressive depth.
Country: Norway
Genre: Power Metal, Progressive Metal
For fans of: Seventh Wonder, Symphony X, Unleash the Archers, Kamelot
Twelve tracks, around 49 minutes, with the cover signed by Yannis Nakos of Remedy Art Design. The song structure is classic and steady — two verses, two choruses, an instrumental passage with a guitar solo and a final chorus — and the band does not try to hide it.
Our take
The element that stands out at once is Ida Haukland. On vocals and bass, she moves from raspy heavy metal outbursts to high, perfectly controlled power metal passages, without ever losing control. Few singers in the genre move with such ease between the two.
The songwriting does not play games: the riffs are catchy, the choruses rise, and the key or chord changes arrive where you least expect them. «Of Tyrants» is the most direct example, with drive and feverish guitar, but it wins through repetition — it is one of those tracks that reveal themselves on the fifth listen, not the first.
Those looking for the complexity of the more extreme progressive acts may find less of it here. Triosphere lean clearly toward power metal, and their depth comes from execution and melodic inventiveness rather than structural subversion. But when the result is this well-crafted, the choice holds up.
See also: Metal De Facto – «Land of the Rising Sun» | Dreadnought – Wars of Spirit // Wards of Light.
