I’ve added this album to my Recommended Listening page. Lauri Porra is best known as the recent bass player for Stratovarius, which is where I first discovered him. Though power metal genre doesn’t leave much room for bass players to show their skills, I saw them live a while back and he was given a spot for a bass solo that really impressed me. I looked into him and discovered that he had a solo album, and when I listened to the sample I was blown away. His solo career is not metal at all, the first album he released would be more closely classified as Jazz and his style of playing is very similar to that of Jaco Pastorius. Coming from a guy with bands like Stratovarius, Sinergy and Lordi on his resume this was a pleasant surprise.

In 2007 he released his second album, All Children Have Superpowers. I didn’t find out until a few years later, and even after buying it I didn’t give it much attention until I was recently looking for something to listen to on the bus. I’m not really sure how to describe this one. The album is mostly instrumental, with some wordless vocals on one track and a woman singing in Finnish on the final track. The first couple of tracks have a very Pink Floyd feel to them, there’s a song that sounds like something Chuck Mangione might have written, and there are some tracks with a heavy drudgery to them. Overall it’s a very laid back album.

He’s two for two in my book. I like his solo stuff way more than I like Stratovarius, it’s much more my style these days. I don’t know if he plans to ever release any more solo material, but I certainly hope he does. I also hope the album he recorded with Sinergy eventually gets released, because the one album of theirs I’m familiar with is great.

I have the worst morning breath right now, and nobody around to care. I’m just gonna enjoy this for a bit