First Spin Impressions

[heaven&hell]

Metalium - MILLENNIUM METAL CHAPTER ONE (1999)

 

I'm not exactly sure how I missed out on this disc when it was first released during the Great Euro-Power Metal Resurgence of the late 90s but I got it now. Metalium is a decent, although totally unoriginal, power metal band that has a great lead vocalist (Henning Basse) backed by such all stars as Chris Caffery (guitars) and Mike Terrana (drummer for Rage) and sounds like a mish mosh of the best stuff from Gamma Ray, Helloween, Primal Fear, Iron Savior, and virtually every other metal band that's come from Germany in the past 20 years. Not an essential purchase by any means but definitely a fun listen. I could do without the ridiculous sci-fi concept (some nonsense about "true metallians" saving the earth, or whatever) but the performances are fine and that Basse guy can definitely wail his ass off. The cover version of Deep Purple's "Smoke On The Water" that closes the disc seems a little out of place compared with the other tracks, though.

Anyway, I traded away a real P.O.S. disc to get this one (Temple Of Brutality's LETHAL AGENDA) so I definitely got the better end of the deal.

 

 

Dude I got this when it came out back in the late 90s?? It's pretty good.. But, look for their other stuff.. It gets better with each album they put out.. I think they matured a bit on their second album, Definitely worth a listen.....

 

 

I never got around to getting any of their other discs even though I wanted too.

I might be alone but I think their debut is awesome.

The cover of Accept's "Burning" kicks ass too.

[Fat Freddy]

Dude I got this when it came out back in the late 90s?? It's pretty good.. But, look for their other stuff.. It gets better with each album they put out.. I think they matured a bit on their second album, Definitely worth a listen.....

 

Meh, this one's OK but I dunno if I'll bother seeking out more Metalium. With a lot of these late 90s power metal bands, one disc is really all you need cuz each subsequent one sounds like the same album with different song titles

[Dark Star]

Dude I got this when it came out back in the late 90s?? It's pretty good.. But, look for their other stuff.. It gets better with each album they put out.. I think they matured a bit on their second album, Definitely worth a listen.....

 

Meh, this one's OK but I dunno if I'll bother seeking out more Metalium. With a lot of these late 90s power metal bands, one disc is really all you need cuz each subsequent one sounds like the same album with different song titles

 

 

Yea I was feeling the same way Myself.. But I took a chance, and picked up their second album.. Man am I Glad I did, as I like it a whole bunch more than their first album.. But, that's just Me too.....

[Geoff]

Evidence One - 'The sky is the limit' ; Starts out good and the title track is great, but a lot of it is pretty average. If you liked 'Tattooed heart' this is pretty much a follow-up to that in every regard, but they're straying futher away from the great debut if you ask me.

 

Human Zoo - 'Over the horizon' ; wow, this is f*cking fantasic!!! Heads straight into my top 5 of the year in the MHR/AOR field. Great melodic hard rock and at least as good as the debut, if not better.

 

Martie Peters Group - 'Road to salvation' ; hmm, seemed okay but not great. There's a few very solid gems on here and it definitely needs another listen. The new version of 'Waiting in the line' is completely unnecessary, though, and pales considerably compared to the original.

 

12 Stones - 'Anthem for the underdog' ; huge surprise. Their debut is average sloppy modern rock, but they've gone for some cool choruses here, a beefier sound. There's still fillers, but there's some really great tracks here. One for Chris and Mark to check out.

 

Emerson Hart - 'Cigarettes and gasoline' ; pretty cool modern rock. Some truly excellent songs, quite a lot of fillers though. There are some really beautiful songs on this one, though. Looking forward to another listen.

 

Evans Blue - 'The melody and the energetic nature of volume' and ;'The pursuit begins when thhis portrayal of life ends'; first I ever heard of these guys and Chris and Mark (I think they're about the only nu-metal lovin' fiends still here) will love these guys. On the surface it's standard nu-metal, modern heavy rock, but there are some excellent choruses and melodic hooks here. Both albums are great, the new one probably a bit better. Like all other nu-metal I'm sure this'll wear thin soon, but on first impression this is very good stuff. Good band and on the new one there was one of my favourite songs of the year... track 3 - sensational.

 

Jet Trail - 'Edge of existence' ; This is great melodic hard rock. Right up there with Alyson Avenue and stuff, IMO... better than Dante Fox by a mile. I'm digging this. Musically awesome too.

[Geoff]

Kyle Vincent - 'A night like this' ; Wow, f*cking awesome melodic rock. I absolutely loved this... don't know how it's (he) evaded me for so long.

 

Sixx AM - 'The Heroine Diaries sountrack' ; Very cool CD. At times very heavy on the whole death related lyrics... sounds like a hardcore emo CD at times, lyrically... lol. But the songs are really good. Best Motley Crue related release since 'Dr Feelgood' if you ask me. Great stuff.

 

The Starting Line - 'Say it like you mean it' ; Very nice. Reminds me a lot of Spitalfield and SR-71, but not as good. I've had their 2005 release for ever and as good as it is, I never found it amazing. This album (from 2002) is actually better and I now see why they were often recommended to me.

 

The Starting Line - 'Direction' ; heavier new release. I like the new direction and there's some really excellent songs here, especially at the start of the disc. A few average ones here too, though.

[Geoff]

One Less Reason - 'Everydaylife' ; more good "nu-metal" which seems pretty essential for fans of the genre. This is good stuff. 100% what you'd expect from a nu-metal release... slow dreary verses about life being hard and unfair (though there's a few cool ones here) and good melodic/catchy choruses. Good stuff, for what it is.

[heaven&hell]

Sixx AM - 'The Heroine Diaries sountrack' ; Very cool CD. At times very heavy on the whole death related lyrics... sounds like a hardcore emo CD at times, lyrically... lol. But the songs are really good. Best Motley Crue related release since 'Dr Feelgood' if you ask me. Great stuff.

 

I thought you'd like that one.

[TIM (2)]

Sixx AM - 'The Heroine Diaries sountrack' ; Very cool CD. At times very heavy on the whole death related lyrics... sounds like a hardcore emo CD at times, lyrically... lol. But the songs are really good. Best Motley Crue related release since 'Dr Feelgood' if you ask me. Great stuff.

 

I thought you'd like that one.

 

Me too. Awesome disc. Never really a Crue fan but this is a killer new Modern Metal disc...

[Geoff]

Caliban - 'The undying darkness' ; Good solid album for screamo fans. If I'm in the mood I do enjoy this, but pretty much only one CD at a time. Even towards the end of this one you start to think, didn't I just hear this song? There's not enough melodic choruses here or variation to keep me too interested, but this is a cool band to listen to when you hate the f*ckin' world... or something equally emo.

 

Caliban - 'The awakening' ; continues right where the last one left off. As I said, good band for screamo fans, but very little variety and one song trails off into the next and it's near-impossible to tell them apart. Again, good "angry" music. Thanks, Tim (2) for pointing these guys out a while back too. I did take not, just took a while to get around to them. I would love to hear them try something a little more melodic like Still Remains.

 

One Less Reason - 'Getting back your self esteem' ; I'm going to start a thread about these guys soon because this is exactly the type of band that I think will reach out to the Nickelback/Hinder fans on the board. Excellent modern rock, and this EP is actually probably even better than 'Everydaylife', with more up-tempo tracks and some great choruses. A very cool band.

 

Still Remains - 'Of love and lunacy' ; I'm actually really enjoying this one. After the 2 caliban CDs I have a bit of screamo overload going on, but these guys can really create a great chorus and do well what I feel Caliban need to do. Very good album, enjoying it a lot.

[Geoff]

Road to Ruin - s/t ; another swing and a miss for Matt Alfonzetti. To be blunt, and in no need of further listens, the 3rd song is good... the other eight are crap. Just a boring hard rock release which will fade immediately into oblivion along with Skintrade's albums and Alfonzetti's 'Machine' CD.

 

Speaking of Alfonzetti, whatever happened to Damned Nation???

[TIM (2)]

GOODBYE THRILL - S/T

 

This is terrific stuff. Way more melodic than I expected, this is remarkably similar sounding to the Ted Poley album last year & very lush/slick Melodic Rock. They really remind me of Casanova (not sure if the singer is American?) with their strong vocal hooks & great harmonies. The guitar work is gorgeous & the opening salvo of tunes will just blow you away. Awesome.

 

PRIMAL FEAR - New Religion

 

A mixed bag. Very commercial towards the end, but opening with a huge Metal number, this is an album of two halves. Am sure it will grow ("Seven Seals" needed to) & some of the musicianship is killer, but a wait & see on this one...

 

DOWN - III: Over the Under

 

Another monster from Anselmo & the boys, great Modern Metal with some great songwriting. This band havent disappointed yet & this sounds like another monster disc.

[heaven&hell]

The Cult- Born into This

 

I f#@king love this cd. The great thing about The Cult is that no two cds sound the same and they continue to grow and bring different elements into each release. While this cd isn't quite as good as the perfect 'Beyond Good Evil', it's still a great cd. Fav songs so far are "Dirty Little Rockstar", "I Assasin", "Holy Mountain", "Tiger in the Sun", and "Born into This".

[Fat Freddy]

Dokken - BREAKING THE CHAINS (1983)

Yup, believe it or not, even though I have loved Dokken for many years and own all of their other studio albums, I had never gotten round to picking this one up for whatever reason. It's funny cuz till recently I had the "Very Best Of Dokken" comp on Rhino that contained 2 songs from this record - the title track and "Paris Is Burning," but when I realized it was kinda silly to have a compilation of which I had all the other songs already, I traded it off and got BREAKING THE CHAINS to finally fill this outstanding hole in my collection. Y'know what though? I should've just kept the compilation, because the title track and "Paris Is Burning" are the best songs on it. Everything in between those two is just kinda "Ehhh." I'm glad to finally have this album to complete my Dokken collection but I think I'll be listening to BACK FOR THE ATTACK and DYSFUNCTIONAL a lot more often.

[heaven&hell]

Dokken - BREAKING THE CHAINS (1983)

Yup, believe it or not, even though I have loved Dokken for many years and own all of their other studio albums, I had never gotten round to picking this one up for whatever reason. It's funny cuz till recently I had the "Very Best Of Dokken" comp on Rhino that contained 2 songs from this record - the title track and "Paris Is Burning," but when I realized it was kinda silly to have a compilation of which I had all the other songs already, I traded it off and got BREAKING THE CHAINS to finally fill this outstanding hole in my collection. Y'know what though? I should've just kept the compilation, because the title track and "Paris Is Burning" are the best songs on it. Everything in between those two is just kinda "Ehhh." I'm glad to finally have this album to complete my Dokken collection but I think I'll be listening to BACK FOR THE ATTACK and DYSFUNCTIONAL a lot more often.

 

 

"Nightrider" kicks butt too.

[Fat Freddy]

Dokken - BREAKING THE CHAINS (1983)

Yup, believe it or not, even though I have loved Dokken for many years and own all of their other studio albums, I had never gotten round to picking this one up for whatever reason. It's funny cuz till recently I had the "Very Best Of Dokken" comp on Rhino that contained 2 songs from this record - the title track and "Paris Is Burning," but when I realized it was kinda silly to have a compilation of which I had all the other songs already, I traded it off and got BREAKING THE CHAINS to finally fill this outstanding hole in my collection. Y'know what though? I should've just kept the compilation, because the title track and "Paris Is Burning" are the best songs on it. Everything in between those two is just kinda "Ehhh." I'm glad to finally have this album to complete my Dokken collection but I think I'll be listening to BACK FOR THE ATTACK and DYSFUNCTIONAL a lot more often.

 

 

"Nightrider" kicks butt too.

 

Meh, it's OK, I guess... although that song "Felony" was just annoying. After the third or fourth repeat of the chorus ("Fel-O-KNEEEEEE!") I wanted to jam a pencil in my ear.

[eaglesfan3000]

Dream Police - Messing With The Blues

 

I just got this disc yesterday and it just blew my fucking socks off great hooks with heavy guitar and a bluesy sound, a true Scandi melodic metal band without keyboards who would of thunk it. Now I can't wait to get their self titled disc I hear that one is even better. I got to tell ya it's the best $25 I've spent in a long time, I'm really impressed with these guys.

[heaven&hell]

Dokken - BREAKING THE CHAINS (1983)

Yup, believe it or not, even though I have loved Dokken for many years and own all of their other studio albums, I had never gotten round to picking this one up for whatever reason. It's funny cuz till recently I had the "Very Best Of Dokken" comp on Rhino that contained 2 songs from this record - the title track and "Paris Is Burning," but when I realized it was kinda silly to have a compilation of which I had all the other songs already, I traded it off and got BREAKING THE CHAINS to finally fill this outstanding hole in my collection. Y'know what though? I should've just kept the compilation, because the title track and "Paris Is Burning" are the best songs on it. Everything in between those two is just kinda "Ehhh." I'm glad to finally have this album to complete my Dokken collection but I think I'll be listening to BACK FOR THE ATTACK and DYSFUNCTIONAL a lot more often.

 

 

"Nightrider" kicks butt too.

 

Meh, it's OK, I guess... although that song "Felony" was just annoying. After the third or fourth repeat of the chorus ("Fel-O-KNEEEEEE!") I wanted to jam a pencil in my ear.

 

 

I like that one better than "Young Girls".

[Jez]

Dream Police - Messing With The Blues

 

I just got this disc yesterday and it just blew my fucking socks off great hooks with heavy guitar and a bluesy sound, a true Scandi melodic metal band without keyboards who would of thunk it. Now I can't wait to get their self titled disc I hear that one is even better. I got to tell ya it's the best $25 I've spent in a long time, I'm really impressed with these guys.

 

 

I love 'Messing With the Blues', but I must admit, the 'S/T' is a lot better overall and one of my Fave Scandie discs ever.

[heaven&hell]

Dream Police - Messing With The Blues

 

I just got this disc yesterday and it just blew my fucking socks off great hooks with heavy guitar and a bluesy sound, a true Scandi melodic metal band without keyboards who would of thunk it. Now I can't wait to get their self titled disc I hear that one is even better. I got to tell ya it's the best $25 I've spent in a long time, I'm really impressed with these guys.

 

 

I love 'Messing With the Blues', but I must admit, the 'S/T' is a lot better overall and one of my Fave Scandie discs ever.

 

 

I've never heard of this band.

[Jez]

Dream Police - Messing With The Blues

 

I just got this disc yesterday and it just blew my fucking socks off great hooks with heavy guitar and a bluesy sound, a true Scandi melodic metal band without keyboards who would of thunk it. Now I can't wait to get their self titled disc I hear that one is even better. I got to tell ya it's the best $25 I've spent in a long time, I'm really impressed with these guys.

 

 

I love 'Messing With the Blues', but I must admit, the 'S/T' is a lot better overall and one of my Fave Scandie discs ever.

 

 

I've never heard of this band.

 

 

http://www.heavyharmonies.com/cgi-bin/glam...me=Dream+Police

 

Great band, although their discs are getting a little pricey now. Trond Holter is now guitarist in Wig Wam if ya didn't know. Definately one of the better Scandie bands of the time.

[Dave]

Dream Police - Messing With The Blues

 

I just got this disc yesterday and it just blew my fucking socks off great hooks with heavy guitar and a bluesy sound, a true Scandi melodic metal band without keyboards who would of thunk it. Now I can't wait to get their self titled disc I hear that one is even better. I got to tell ya it's the best $25 I've spent in a long time, I'm really impressed with these guys.

 

 

I love 'Messing With the Blues', but I must admit, the 'S/T' is a lot better overall and one of my Fave Scandie discs ever.

 

 

I've never heard of this band.

 

Me neither but now they have my attention.

[Geoff]

Dream Police - Messing With The Blues

 

I just got this disc yesterday and it just blew my fucking socks off great hooks with heavy guitar and a bluesy sound, a true Scandi melodic metal band without keyboards who would of thunk it. Now I can't wait to get their self titled disc I hear that one is even better. I got to tell ya it's the best $25 I've spent in a long time, I'm really impressed with these guys.

 

 

I love 'Messing With the Blues', but I must admit, the 'S/T' is a lot better overall and one of my Fave Scandie discs ever.

 

 

I've never heard of this band.

I've never heard anyone say a good word about 'Messing with the blues'. If you like that album your ballsack will literally explode when you heard the debut... a brilliant album. I only liked one song off 'Messing with the blues'... forget the name, but it was a hard rocker, much in line with the majority of the debut. Which is essential.

[Dave]

Dream Police - Messing With The Blues

 

I just got this disc yesterday and it just blew my fucking socks off great hooks with heavy guitar and a bluesy sound, a true Scandi melodic metal band without keyboards who would of thunk it. Now I can't wait to get their self titled disc I hear that one is even better. I got to tell ya it's the best $25 I've spent in a long time, I'm really impressed with these guys.

 

 

I love 'Messing With the Blues', but I must admit, the 'S/T' is a lot better overall and one of my Fave Scandie discs ever.

 

 

I've never heard of this band.

 

Me neither but now they have my attention.

 

 

Found this Wes. It's not a video clip but it is one of their tracks - "Hot Legs"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DjX5vKb0ZJA...ted&search=

[Geoff]

Emerson Hart - 'Cigarettes and gasoline' ; pretty cool modern rock. Some truly excellent songs, quite a lot of fillers though. There are some really beautiful songs on this one, though. Looking forward to another listen.

I just found out, this is actually the ex-lead singer of Tonic... amazing how similar it is to Tonic now that I think of it. Some absolute gems, but an abundance of fillers too.

[heaven&hell]

Dream Police - Messing With The Blues

 

I just got this disc yesterday and it just blew my fucking socks off great hooks with heavy guitar and a bluesy sound, a true Scandi melodic metal band without keyboards who would of thunk it. Now I can't wait to get their self titled disc I hear that one is even better. I got to tell ya it's the best $25 I've spent in a long time, I'm really impressed with these guys.

 

 

I love 'Messing With the Blues', but I must admit, the 'S/T' is a lot better overall and one of my Fave Scandie discs ever.

 

 

I've never heard of this band.

 

Me neither but now they have my attention.

 

 

Found this Wes. It's not a video clip but it is one of their tracks - "Hot Legs"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DjX5vKb0ZJA...ted&search=

 

 

They sound good. Thanks for posting that link.