This is Seventh Avenue's fourth album and their style can be described as Power Metal with central choruses and melodic leads. One thing I like about his album is the will to experiment and create tunes that has more to offer than the well know riff-verse-chorus-solo-riff-verse-chorus formula.
A Step Between The Worlds is a very melodic and fast song and also one of the album's best, the guitar lick sounds phenomenal and the catchy chorus contributes to the very bright atmosphere.
The creative bass approach is a strong aspect in
Levy Your Soul From Hate, the dull refrain pulls it in the other direction and it settles at around OK, missing a tighter structure.
Tale Of The Forgotten Dreams feeds on an intense and diverse drum execution spiced with challenging guitar twists. The great swift solo sets in at the right time but again a tiresome chorus is its biggest problem.
Angel Eyes on the other hand has a very melodic chorus nicely brought to life by a harmonious vocal performance. The acoustic guitar section adds texture and the sporadic leads also enhance the songs durability.
Open Your Mind suffers from mediocre ideas and it don't leave a big impression before it's all over. The calm vocal part sounds too forced. The first simple guitar solo and an uninspiring main rhythm makes it hard to keep the focus fixed, at the end the structure gets twisted with a positive outcome but overall I'm not impressed at all.
The instrumental
Strom Ii is quite good and the arrangements is melted together in a harmonious way, the piano part in the start reminds me of Dream Theater's Through My Words. Anyway this is a cool instrumental with a diverse nature having some thrilling guitar leads.
Until You Come Again is a very standard track in every aspect, it simply hasn't got much exciting to offer and it kind of just goes by without you really noticing it.
The speedy
Wings Of Dawn wins a lot from its melodic chorus and here the different passages seem to be tighter connected.
With
Touch Of Your Love we reach the albums ballad, the relaxed vocal approach and symphonic keys does a good job in creating a compelling atmosphere, the song is just dragged out too far.
A refreshing rocking vibe is the main foundation in
Burning Heart, incorporated groovy bass lines and a quite good melodic refrain.
One Life Ends is an extensive and well-performed cut, added an intense and fast mid-section with screaming vocals and piercing leads in great harmony.
This very lengthy record could have been more coherent and with a more distinguishing character if some of these songs had been given more "stand out" features, I just don't think that there is enough good and original ideas for a 66-minute effort.
What you can't take away form this album is the good songs it has, and there is luckily a bunch of them.
The lyric side of the record is very concerned with religious themes and personal encounters in life; good vs. evil, love, the will for a better world and seeking deeper knowledge. It works, but again nothing over the top.
On the production front things are looking quite good, the balance and level of clearness is high but it misses a bit more punch and bite.
Some elements are way too standard and quite boring; on the other hand it does have some great melodic moments and a firm execution making it an overall above average release.
Written by
Tommy Tuesday, February 15, 2005
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