Dreamtale - Phoenix (2008)

Phoenix is the fourth studio album by Finnish power metal band Dreamtale.

Dreamtale was founded by Rami Keränen in the early months of 1999. The band first gathered fame by playing as Sinergy's supporting act in Finland, but the biggest fuzz was made when they released their second demo "Refuge from Reality": it was sold out on its day of release!

Most copies of the demo were sold to Japan and it didn't take long before rumors of a hot new metal-band reached record labels' ears. Dreamtale started receiving recording deal offers from all over the world, and in August 2001 a deal with Spinefarm Records was sealed.

In December 2001, Dreamtale started the recordings of "Beyond Reality". After giving the album its finishing touches, Dreamtale went through changes in their line-up: bassist Alois Weimer was replaced by Pasi Ristolainen, and a new singer, Tomi Viiltola, joined the group

"Beyond Reality", which was released in Japan in June and elsewhere during July 2002, sold amazing amounts in Japan and the band gathered a loyal following. The Japanese fans simply couldn't wait to get more, so the recordings of a second full-length album were decided to start as soon as possible.

Recordings for their second album Ocean's Heart were begun in January 2003 at Fantom studios Finland, where the album was then mixed by Samu Oittinen. Finishing touches were added with Mika Jussila's mastering at the famed Finnvox-studios.

Track listing 1. "Yesterday's News" – 3:33
2. "Eyes Of The Clown" – 4:43
3. "Payback" – 4:44
4. "Failed States" – 3:49
5. "Take What The Heavens Create" – 2:53
6. "Great Shadow" – 5:15
7. "No Angels No More" – 3:46
8. "Faceless Men" – 4:16
9. "Firebird" – 3:47
10. "The Vigilante" – 4:46

Personel
* Erkki Seppänen - Vocals
* Rami Keränen - Guitar
* Seppo Kolehmaine - Guitar
* Akseli Kaasalainen - Keyboards
* Pasi Ristolainen - Bass
* Arto Pitkänen - Drums

DragonForce - Ultra Beatdown (2008)

Ultra Beatdown is the fourth studio album by DragonForce, released on 20 August 2008 in Japan through JVC and on 26 August 2008 worldwide through Roadrunner Records [4] and Universal Music.[5] It was the first studio album to feature Frédéric Leclercq on bass. On 4 July 2008 the first single from the album, "Heroes of Our Time", was posted on their MySpace profile.[6] On 8 July 2008, the music video for Heroes of Our Time was released onto their MySpace profile. The songs "Heartbreak Armageddon", "The Fire Still Burns" and "A Flame for Freedom" were all played on 106.1 Rock Radio during a interview with ZP Theart on 15 July 2008.[7] On 14 August 2008 Ultra Beatdown was made available for pre-order in the DragonForce official web store. On 18 August 2008 the album became available for streaming on the band's MySpace page.

Prior to the album's release, the shortest song (excluding "Invocation of Apocalyptic Evil", the 14-second intro on Valley of the Damned) was the track "Dawn Over a New World", from the second album, Sonic Firestorm. This honour now goes to the special edition track "Strike of the Ninja". This song also holds the honour of being the first and, so far, only unedited song recorded by DragonForce with a length of less than five minutes, albeit due to it being a re-recorded version of "Feel the Fire" by Sam Totman's side project Shadow Warriors.

Track listing
1. "Heroes of Our Time"
2. "The Fire Still Burns"
3. "Reasons to Live"
4. "Heartbreak Armageddon"
5. "The Last Journey Home"
6. "A Flame for Freedom"
7. "Inside the Winter Storm"
8. "The Warrior Inside"


Band members
* ZP Theart – vocals
* Herman Li – guitars, backing vocals, producing, mixing, engineering
* Sam Totman – guitars, backing vocals, producing, mixing
* Vadim Pruzhanov – keyboards, piano, theremin, kaoss pad, backing vocals
* Dave Mackintosh – drums, backing vocals
* Frédéric Leclercq – bass, backing vocals, additional guitars

Guest musicians
* Clive Nolan – backing vocals, additional keyboards