Blind Guardian – Imaginations From The Other Side – Live – (Picture Disc) – Vinyl LP

BLIND GUARDIAN – consisting of vocalist Hansi Kürsch, guitarists André Olbrich and Marcus Siepen and drummer Frederik Ehmke – have been considered one of the most significant melodic/prog protagonists in the heavy metal field from the very beginning due to their individual sound.

The albums “Imaginations From The Other Side” (1995), “The Forgotten Tales” (1996) and “Nightfall In Middle-Earth” (1988) brought the Krefeld-based band to the top of the metal scene, so it’s not surprising that they were headliners at festivals such as England’s Bloodstock, Band Your Head and Wacken Open Air.

“Imaginations From The Other Side” repeats the quasi-conceptual nature of the previous two studio releases and perhaps takes it up a notch: the titular opening track abstracts from specific fantasy stories and instead tells a story about fantasy itself, referencing childhood escape fantasies like The Wizard of Oz, Peter Pan, Alice in Wonderland and The Chronicles of Narnia. The album tells the story of a child who escapes through a mirror into an Arthurian world full of swords, dragons and crusades before being brought back to reality. This story is revisited twenty years later on the album Beyond the Red Mirror, which tells of how the “other side” has fallen into darkness and the search for a way back. Imaginations From The Other Side is the last album with Hansi on bass, who from now on devotes himself entirely to singing and writing lyrics. Two singles were released from the album, “A Past and Future Secret” and “Bright Eyes”, which gave the bards a wider audience and made Blind Guardian’s music known in the heavy metal world.