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Beyond Reality is the debut album for the Swedish band, Fatal Smile. The band plays hard rock with some hints of classic heavy metal thrown in. The band includes in its list of influences Whitesnake, Metallica, and Black Sabbath. First off, I give two thumbs up to vocalist H.B. Anderson. He sings with power
and conviction, showing flashes of Blaze Bayley throughout the album. For those
of you who enjoy Blaze Bayley's solo work, you will likely appreciate the vocals
of H.B Anderson. The second strength of this band is the guitar work. The hard
rock guitars are energetic and in your face, sure to make you head bob up and
down more than once. The album features heavy (but not speedy) riffs as well
as slower, yet heavy Sabbath like grooves. As per song variety, the band achieves
a very satisfactory balance with Beyond Reality. There is a good mix
of powerful hard rock tunes with an equal amount of slower, sludgy songs which
seem to be a nod to Black Sabbath. There are no ballads on the album,
and the quality level in consistent throughout. However, the songs are neither
consistently great, nor are they consistently bad. All ten tracks are solid,
yet none of them manage to grab me or stick with me after the album is through.
I attribute this to two factors: All in all, this debut album shows some promise for Fatal Smile. However, the hard rock genre is becoming quite a populated field these days. Therefore, I think the band must work on making their songs more memorable for the listener in order to become a major player on the scene. Some key ingredients for success are already present: superb vocals, aggressive guitars, and clear production. With some work in the songwriting area that I described above, I think the band can take their music to the next level. |
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Killing Songs : All are good songs, but the album lacks a true "killer" song. |
Mike quoted 67 / 100 | |||||
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