Like George Lucas' Return Of The Jedi, Firewind complete their recent trilogy (of music) with "Days Of Defiance". Band leader/guitarist Gus G (currently also serving as Ozzy Osbourne's new axe-man) solidified Firewind's sound and style with the 4th album "Allegiance" in 2006 honing in on an excellent balance of aggression (the title track, ‘Insanity'), melody and musicianship (‘Before The Storm'), and catchy hooks (‘Breaking The Silence', ‘Falling To Pieces'). "The Premonition" (2008), continued the craftsmanship with the singles ‘Head Up High' and ‘Mercenary Man', ‘The Silent Code', and ‘My Loneliness'.

As much as I like and support Firewind (and have since the debut "Between Heaven And Hell"), my review of will not go without its (unbiased) observations, and the only issue with the songs is they don't offer anything any different from "Allegiance" or "Premonition".

Like on previous albums, 'The Ark Of Lies' opens the album with an Iced Earth approach and aggression, a catchy riff (something many of today's newer traditional hard rock and metal bands fail at) kicks off the first single/video ‘World On Fire' and nicely does justice to ‘Breaking The Silence' and ‘Head Up High', but ‘Embrace The Sun' is too close to the keyboard melody and arrangement in ‘Falling To Pieces', still...its enjoyable. ‘The Departure' is really an unnecessary lead-in instrumental to the speedy Euro power metal/Gamma Ray spirited ‘Heading For The Dawn'. Track 7, ‘Broken', is one of the album's highlights with the acoustic guitar/keyboard based verses and electrified chorus and as rudimentary as ‘Cold As Ice' can be its still an unavoidable hook.

The second half of the album I think offers the better songs...'Kill In The Name Of Love', instrumental ‘SKG' is solid but boy is it gonna be tough for Gus to match ‘The Fire And The Fury', ‘Losing Faith', and 'When All Is Said And Done' contain those characteristic elements found on "Allegiance" and "Premonition" without sounding too close to being rehashed. Another plus is the lineup remains the same from "Allegiance" and "Premonition" with one addition, Michael Ehre on drums and he's a more than suitable replacement for Mark Cross.

"Days Of Defiance" would be a 9 or 10 if it was "Allegiance" but as we all know how hard it is to follow a classic when you're dealing with sequels and/or trilogies. That's why "Defiance" got a 7.5, solid but nothing as revealing as the final act in The Return Of The Jedi, still, enjoyable and recommended. Keep up the good work Gus!