Start from the Dark departs from the glam metal genre and featured a more modern sound compared to Europe's first two albums.[2] "We wanted to be doing something at least that was a little bit relevant now; bit of a dry mix, detuned a bit," vocalist Joey Tempest said, "So we felt like we didn't want to do an '80s album per se, we just wanted to start like a fresh band really."[3] Eventually, the album sold in excess of 600,000 copies worldwide.[4]