Band:	Nightwish
Album:	Over The Hills And Far Away
Style:	Symphonic power metal
Release date:	June 25, 2001
Guest review by:	Lanfawn

01. Over The Hills And Far Away [Gary Moore cover]
02. 10th Man Down
03. Away
04. Astral Romance [2001 version]
05. The Kinslayer [live] [US edition bonus] [2007 Spinefarm remastered edition bonus]
06. She Is My Sin [live] [US edition bonus] [2007 Spinefarm remastered edition bonus]
07. Sacrament Of Wilderness [live] [US edition bonus] [2007 Spinefarm remastered edition bonus]
08. Walking In The Air [live] [US edition bonus] [2007 Spinefarm remastered edition bonus]
09. Beauty And The Beast [live] [2007 Spinefarm remastered edition bonus]
10. Wishmaster [live] [US edition bonus] [2007 Spinefarm remastered edition bonus]
11. Deep Silent Complete [live] [US edition bonus]
12. 10th Man Down [live] [2007 Spinefarm remastered edition bonus]
13. Over The Hills And Far Away [Gary Moore cover] [live] [2007 Spinefarm remastered edition bonus]
14. Over The Hills And Far Away [video] [2007 Spinefarm remastered edition bonus]

After Angels Fall First, people knew about Nightwish. After Oceanborn, they liked Nightwish. And after Wishmaster, they worshipped Nightwish. "No new album this year", Tuomas said. But to not leave the poor fans in endless torment, the divine beings of Nightwish decided to leave this little EP for everyone to play around with. Good thing then that it is far from a low quality one! For here we get no more than 4 perfect tracks, and always remember, those 4 perfect tracks is better than 9 mediocre ones (*cough* Angels Fall First*cough*) or 6 good ones (no example here though). In any case, these are the contents of this little intermission!

The EP begins with the title track. It's a cover of Gary Moore's hit (only famous song?)with the same name of course. Half of the web seems to think they butchered it, while I think they improved it a lot. Tarja's voice does the song considerably more
justice than Gary's did (again, this is my opinion). It tells the tale of a man who is wrongfully accused for a crime. It's very catchy, and has the honour of being the first song I heard with Nightwish. Thus, this one is to thank for my present obsession. Awesome.

10th Man Down follows. And... boy. This is my favourite track with Nightwish, second only to some of their latest offerings (such as Dark Chest of Wonders & Ghost Love Score). It's flawless as long as music goes. Great construction, solos and arguably one of the best choruses within metal. The song is about war, and thus I think it gets really personal as Tarja portrays the role of a man who is in war only because he has to for his country. It's
a very sad song in that way.

Away is next, which is a ballad. It has an amazing intro but sad to say it gets a bit boring after that and the chorus is not without flaws. Still it's a pretty song that works when you are in the mood for that.

Finally we get a remake of Astral Romance from the infamous Angels Fall First. Apparently
Nightwish thought that it was good enough to remake, and well, it is indeed an improvement. I don't really like this song very much despite that though, but it is a very good attempt
of making this 1997 song feel fresh.

If you have purchased the Drakkar version of this EP, you will also get 6 live tracks from From Wishes to Eternity (the live album, naturally). Not much of a bonus really, though I have to admit I was in love with the live version of Deep Silent Complete for a while.

As stated in the beginning of the review, this is about as good as an EP can be. It has 4 pretty much perfect songs on it and the price for it is half of an album's. I can safely say that Nightwish's attempt to fill the void between Wishmaster & Century Child succeeded with flying colours.