"Medea" is the sophomore release from Symphonic Power Metal outfit EX LIBRIS hailing from The Netherlands. From what I can gather, EX LIBRIS funded this album through a successful Kickstarter fundraising campaign. I am unsure how much money the band pulled in from Kickstarter but you can certainly hear some that money going into this record. "Medea" is slickly produced and everything sounds perfectly mixed and mastered.

The level of talent that everybody in the band possesses is intimidating. When I typically think of symphonic power metal bands like EPICA or NIGHTWISH, I typically don't think of every member of those bands possessing a whopping amount of talent. However EX LIBRIS can really shine even when Ms. Giersbergen is keeping silent.

This album really surprised me in how heavy a lot of the songs are. With Power Metal or Goth Metal (even though I wouldn't really consider this band's music Gothic), a lot of bands are more focused on the theatrical elements of the music instead of trying to get the music to sound heavy and large. But just listen to the drums and guitar on "Medea" and you'll see that they don't leave the metal fans hanging. The lead guitar of EX LIBRIS will melt your face off on some of these tracks. You've been warned. There's a juicy little breakdown on "The Dream I Dream" that seems to be a little treat for the mosh pit.

The amazing range and skill of EX LIBRIS' lead singer Dianne van Giersbergen is undoubtedly the band's worst-kept secret. When Dianne breaks out her jaw-dropping soprano voice on "Medea", it has a giant impact on the listener. For instance, on "Daughter of Corinth", she jumps right into the thick of it with her opera A-game but on tracks like "Medea", she keeps her vocal power reserved for specific moments. Sometimes her voice can be too much of a contrast to the music being played since EX LIBRIS rarely reserve themselves from getting loud and heavy. Regardless, you can hear the singing very clearly at all times and not once are they unpleasant to hear. Even on some songs like "Murderess in Me" and "Daughter of Corinth", the vocals can really become more of tangible as a stage-worthy performance than whatever is being played by the band. Dianne van Giersbergen is a metal singer with everything going her.

The reason why I have to give this album 7 out of 10 instead of an 8 is because I have to make some criticism about the contrast of the vocals and the music. As I mentioned before, the instrumentalism goes to extreme places, taking style sample from Metalcore, Progressive, Power, Dark and there was even a Death Metal bridge in "Daughter of Corinth" sans growling vocals. So when you take into account the spectrum of Heavy Metal genre's EX LIBRIS spans across, sometimes the operatic vocals don't sound very appropriate in certain areas of some songs. And the level of fantasy melodrama that is typically expected in Symphonic Power Metal is not really something I gravitate towards musically. This album contains a concept about Medea, the wife of Greek hero and Argonaut Jason. In "Song of Discord", some male operatic vocals show up (provided by singer Damian Wilson of the English Prog Metal band THRESHOLD) and there is even a section of dialogue between Medea (voiced by Giersbergen of course) and Jason. Parts like this that center around the vocals really can take away from the rich sounds that the band makes, an example being the ten minute-long final song "From Birth to Bloodshed".

Seeing how this is not a genre I typically find myself listening to very often, I still found a lot of enjoyment from EX LIBRIS and so they deserve a high rating for this record. I can see them evolving into a much bigger musical act and putting out heavier albums in the future.