LINE-UP

Luca Turilli - Guitars

Alex Staropoli - Keyboards

Fabio Lione - Vocals

Alessandro Lotta - Bass

Alex Holzwarth - Drums

TRACKLIST

1. Rain Of A Thousand Flames
2. Deadly Omen
3. Queen Of The Dark Horizons

    RHYMES OF A TRAGIC POEM -
    THE GOTHIC SAGA

4. Tears Of A Dying Angel
5. Elnor´s Magic Valley
6. The Poem´s Evil Page
7. The Wizard´s Last Rhymes

REVIEW:
This was marketed as a "specially priced mini-album". Well, at least here in Sweden, the retail price was about the same as a normal CD. That´s ok though, because the playing time is over 42 minutes. That´s quite long for a "mini-album", as many groups release full-length albums that are in similar length. So how about the music? It´s great, as usual. It kicks of with a frenzy in classic RHAPSODY-style - the titletrack "Rain Of A Thousand Flames", followed by a slow instrumental. The opening of RHAPSODY-albums are usually the other way around, but this works great too. Then follows my favourite on the album, the almost 14-minute epic "Queen Of The Dark Horizons". The remaining four tracks are not part of the "Emerald Saga" but still sounds great. The annoying narrator takes up too much space on the album, and I don´t like his accent or when he tries to picture himself in the world he descibes. He sound stupid, I´m sorry. Production is great as usual, thanks to Sascha Paeth & Miro once again. I don´t know how to phrase it, the songs are great, but I think a little too "standard". Like Turilli / Staropoli were writing the tracks and releasing the album in order to buy some time while writing new songs for the excellent "Power Of The Dragonflame". But as I said, they are still great songs. It´s just that I´ve learned to expect more than "great" from RHAPSODY.

RATE (out of 10) ******** (8)

		This is the promo edition of the album. It comes in a papercover, and have the same frontcover as the standars commercial release. The back have different picture and also the familiar yellow "band" with red test saying "Not for sale - For promotional use only!" in the upper right corner of the back.
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		This is the special digipack edition. It comes in a special papercover that folds out three (3) times. Slightly different frontcover compared to regular release. A creature pop-up when you open the cover. Very cool. The booklet (same as regular release) is glued into the inside of the cover. This limited edition also includes the videoclip for the titletrack in Mpeg format.
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		The Japanese version of "Rain Of A Thousand Flames" has the same tracks as the other editions. No extratracks which sometime is the case when it comes to Japan editions. The inlay is also identical to the standard European edition. It does however have an "obi" (the paperband on the left on the cover) and an extra 12-page booklet in Japanese. This booklet is in black and white.
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		This is the 12" vinyl picture disc released for the album. Limited to 3000 copies and also includes a full colour poster of the complete cover design.
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A very rare and unusual cassette version of "Rain of a thousand flames". Released by Victor Entertainment as a promo only. Comes in a standard cassette slipcase along with a blue/black/white printed insert. Only text on the insert is the one shown in the scan to the left. Full album on cassette.
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	Fully signed by new line-up (all six members) on front cover. NOTE: I don´t have this myself, but found the picture on the internet and thought it looked so great that I couldn´t resist putting it up here.

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