Search - Revolution Renaissance :: Age of Aquarius

Revolution Renaissance, the new band of the Stratovarius mastermind Timo Tolkki has signed a worldwide deal for one album with Scarlet Records. The last weeks have kept Tolkki and his band members busy putting finishing touches to the band's first real debut album entitled `Age Of Aquarius'. Recorded over three months in Finland, it is by far the darkest, heaviest and most symphonic album that Tolkki has ever been involved in. Finding a close connection with his new band members Gus Monsanto and Bruno Agra, the trio locked itself in a cabin in Finland for a month and composed ten new songs. It is the first time during Tolkki's career that he shared the whole songwriting process with other band members. "I just felt this incredibly fresh vibe with these guys and the songs were just flowing. It was so natural process that it almost felt like the songs were already composed and we just let them be born. It was possible because in Gus and Bruno I finally have found the kindred spirits I have been looking for so long. The results were something that none of us were expecting and yet at the same time, we felt that this record is exactly the way it is supposed to be", comments Tolkki. It is very difficult to describe the style of the music Revolution Renaissance is playing. There are a lot of trademarks from Tolkki's Stratovarius days, his guitar solos are more aggressive and fast than in years, the production is monumental and is enhanced by Agras orchestral arrangements. Gus Monsanto's emotional voice varies from silent whisper to Ronnie James Dioesque power giving the music a new face. There is a lot of drama on "Age Of Aquarius" album. Basically the album consists of three parts: In the first part "Age Of Aquarius", "Sins of my beloved" and "Ixion's Wheel" are more in the vein of traditional melodic heavy rock/metal, "Behind the Mask" was a song composed by Agra/Monsanto and they suggested Tolkki to try this song so lots of different arrangements were tried, but the end result is very close to the original version. It might come as a total surprise to many Tolkki fans, but it has it's distinguished place on the album and a bit of a message too. "Ghost of Fallen Grace" acts as a beautiful and impressive bridge to three songs that are perhaps the biggest, darkest and most emotional during Tolkki's career: "Heart of All", "So She Wears Black" and "Kyrie Eleison" (Greek language, meaning "Lord have mercy"). The production of these three songs extends far beyond the limits of what is considered to be a standard heavy rock/metal album. Filled with huge orchestral orchestrations of Agra, blistering leads of Tolkki, emotional vocals of Monsanto, punchy crystal clear and powerful drums of Agra, tasteful keyboard texturing of Khalilov up to the solid groundwork of Biggs, "Age of Aquarius" is definitely mixture of something old and something new. The album finishes with and optimistic anthem "Into the Future", with its Celtic influences gives the album a positive and bright expectation of the years to come for this band. Revolution Renaissance was already chosen as a "Band of the Year" by a Brazilian magazine Whiplash. The tours are currently been booked for an extensive World Tour.