Innerwish

Stumbled upon these guys today. What rock have I been living under. This is great...

You should search Ulterium Records.  They have several artists in the power/melodic metal style (some of which I'm sure you know already).  Harmony, Signum Regis, Diviner, Theocracy, Darkwater, Millennial Reign (just to name a few).

If you haven't, your really need to check out Diviner. Reminds me a little of Dio at times.

Good idea, Staybrite, to search a label. Can't say I've ever done that. I just stumble through the music landscape finding sounds I like and sounds I don't.
Diviner's been in the charts lately with their song "Heaven Falls" -- great harmonies.

I like this song.  I have one CD from Innerwish that I know of.  I had completely forgotten about them.  They have a very strong sound!

Innerwish falls into that category of sounding good, at first, then they get very samey. IMO at least.

I hear ya Black Rider. I've been exploring their catalogue since posting "Needles..." here yesterday. It's all wonderfully performed and very, very good, but definitely has a distinctive "Innerwish sound" that is pretty consistent throughout.
That sounding the same is a common trap. As a songwriter, I know it's one that is easily fallen into. For me, it's A flat minor. If I'm just tooling about on the piano or the guitar, I'll usually end up mindlessly on A flat minor. The way around this failing is to write more consciously -- say, "today I'm writing in F#m" or whatever -- but also to listen to a lot of different types of music. I knew a guy who always wrote the same melody with a few subtle changes here and there and different music and lyrics. He was so involved in the music, he didn't see what was so obvious to everyone else until it was pointed out to him that he had half a dozen songs that were essentially the same song. lol
The other reason bands start to sound samey is because the vocalist has just one instrument. There is a set range to work with and the music needs to be written with the vocalist in mind. Also, within that range, there is a much smaller comfortable range where most of the vocal needs to sit, further restricting the possibilities.
And then of course there's the usual commercial pressures from the label to do more of the same because that's what sold in the past. Plus pressure from the fans to do more of the same. Crazy

It also seems to be a problem with that sound, the European power metal. A few bands like Theocracy manage to avoid it which is refreshing.

I suppose that'd be their progressive side coming through. A little genre crossing there

Jen5 wrote:

Good idea, Staybrite, to search a label. Can't say I've ever done that. I just stumble through the music landscape finding sounds I like and sounds I don't.
Diviner's been in the charts lately with their song "Heaven Falls" -- great harmonies.

I do that quite often in the last few years.  I have discovered a couple of really cool bands just because they share a record label with another band I like.