Review by Adam M on September 13, 2016.

Evergrey are back with another fine slab of progressive metal. Their music is uplifting sounding and makes one head-bang along with the music. The riffs are huge and catchy sounding yet again. Even better, the vocalist glides across the songs and adds his presence to them. The entire affair is some of the biggest sounding progressive metal you’ll find. It’s more focused and accessible than a lot of Dream Theater for certain. This is a nice compromise of complexity with an intelligible approach that is nice and easy to grip onto.

Tracks like Someday or Disconnect will grip your attention with their intuitiveness. The band manages to strike this balance atop some great musical performances as well. Guitars are crisp and clear and drumming provides a nice background to the rest of the music. The band is melodramatic, but don’t think these songs are sissy songs. There is enough musical muscle to back up the moods and add a punch to the tracks. Whether this surpasses Hymns For The Broken, the band’s last album is up for debate. There are great tracks here too, but the amount of memorable moments on that disc is very hard to top. Still, the atmospheres here are very fine too and worthy in their own right. The tracks are of average length which is perfect for the band to find their muse with. This still doesn’t pass Hymns For The Broken, which is unfortunate because the band were on an upswing on that album.

Still, the band is far from coasting here – they are passionate about their approach. Ending with the title track, Evergrey is driven throughout the length of The Storm Within. Some of the finer moments on the disc come towards its end, which shows just how great of an album this is. If you haven’t heard the band before, this is as good an album as any to start with. Enjoy the ride.

Rating: 8 out of 10