After Forever once again went the concept album route with their third full-length effort, 2004's Invisible Circles. Only this time, the Dutch gothic-operatic-death-power-prog metal band (yes, all that!) arguably placed as much emphasis on their lyrics (discussing a young girl's coming of age tale in all matters of faith, love, loneliness, and even technology) as they did the music. Almost too much, some might argue, since the challenges of making sense of such an overwrought story line and numerous characters often distracted listeners from the band's concurrent attempts to uncork the same sort of complex yet fluidly composed prog epics Read more on Last.fm.
