2018 release. A band needs plenty of exceptional compositional talent to record an album that sounds monolithic despite the fact that the individual songs ooze a wide range of different details and special features. Since it's foundation in 2001, Manimal from Gothenburg have successfully mastered this feat for the third time. Despite their loyalty to traditional influences their previous albums, The Darkest Room (2009) and Trapped In The Shadows (2015), were prime examples of modern and trend-setting power metal characterized by musical enthusiasm and new ideas. Purgatorio sees the four-piece take their outstanding qualities to the brink of perfection. Throughout their nine new songs, the musicians pull out all the stops, presenting a number of different tempos and atmospheres and impressing with chorus parts that have true anthem potential. "Our goal has always been to write songs that we love and believe in. The challenge is to make a song with strong hooks without being too predictable. It's just a bonus when we realize that people around the world seem to have the same good taste in music that we have," jokes frontman Samuel Nyman.