Well, the first think I noticed when I put this on for the first time was just how lush the music sounded. There is really just an incredibly full sound coming from this record. The lushness of this album really gives the album a quite mystical feeling to it as well. I felt that Rachel’s vocals always had a certain mysticalness about them, but now that is also echoed through the music. Speaking of Rachel, her vocals on this album are just as great as they were on The Storm. She is even joined by Heather Findlay of Mostly Autumn, who sings background on the track "Heart of Stone". Guitarist Ian Jones also does a very good job on this album—the guitars are nice, smooth, and aurally pleasing.

The songs on this album are very well done. While The Storm had a couple of sub-par songs on it, I can honestly say that I don’t feel this album has any at all. I also enjoy the fact that the songs, on the whole, are longer than they were on The Storm. Most songs fall in the 5-7 minute range, excluding the first track (which is really just an intro). Some of my favorite tracks on the album include "Time Stands Still", "After the Rain", "Strange Behaviour" and "Heart of Stone". The latter song, clocking in at over ten minutes, is probably the best song Karnataka has ever recorded. There are some nice tempo changed going through the song as to not render the listener bored. "Out of Reach" is also a very nice song—it has some beautiful acoustic guitars in it which compliment Rachel’s voice quite nicely.

For me, Delicate Flame of Desire is undoubtedly better than The Storm. While The Storm was a great album, Delicate Flame of Desire is just on another level—the song writing in particular was improved a lot. I would recommend this to anyone who enjoyed The Storm, enjoys progressive rock with pop influence, or anyone who just likes good relaxing music.

9 / 10