Let me get one point straight... german power metal can't really be considered a whole scene... I mean, are you putting Blind Guardian in the same league as Edguy? Both bands play entirely different brands of power metal!
Well, my favourite kind of PM is that whose riffs can actually be heard, and isn't excessively cheesy. That includes of course the almighty Blind Guardian, Hammerfall, Mystic Prophecy, Brainstorm and Helloween on the european side... but you're forgetting an important wave of power metal, and that's the most underrated of them all: the US power metal. Bands like Jag Panzer, Steel Prophet, Kamelot and Iced Earth (some IE songs can be called power metal) play power metal in a more aggressive and riff-laden fashion than most european bands, and that's why it shouldn't be ignored!
Anyway, I like most power metal, but keyboard-laden-played-at-maxim-speed PM like Rhapsody and Sonata Arctica sometimes gets on my nerves. So, italian and finnish power metal (unless it's CoB, of course) aren't really my thing...
Oh, and NWOBHM bands don't play power metal...
__________________
Continue to seek it and you'll see, life is your worst enemy | 
Linear Mode
