Stream of Passion are probably most known because Ayreon mastermind Arjen Lucassen was their original guitarist. This is  the band’s second album - the first without Lucassen’s wizardry - and it is quite a departure from the ‘Embrace the Storm’ debut.

‘The Flame Within’ is not a progressive metal album, unlike its predecessor. It is straight-forward symphonic metal with an ungodly amount of emotion, communicated perfectly with vocalist Marcella Bovio. Unfortunately, this appears to be the only consistently good attribute with the release. Too often do the guitars stray into blunt and forced heavy guitar riffs, as evidenced on ‘The Art of Loss’ and ‘Run Away’. There are a few ballads but they are all unmemorable, particularly the closing theme ‘All I Know’.

However, the multi-faceted ‘Games We Play’ dabbles in progressive metal territory if only for a while with satisfying results, and the moody bass on ‘Now or Never’ is a great feature of the climactic song. The storm of emotion on this release is well conducted but nothing too discernible from other bands in the genre. Lucassen is missed.

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