Artist: At Vance
GTitle: Facing Your Enemy
Genre: Hard Rock/ Power Metal/ Melodic Metal
Release Date: 27th April 2012
Label: AFM Records
Album Review
AT VANCE are a German band founded in 1998, as most bands they’ve been through shake ups on the line-up, their present vocalist, Rick Altzi replaced the original singer Oliver Hartman and Mats Levén, and that’s not touching on the other changes. Their latest, ninth, studio album ‘Face Your Enemies’ was released already in April this year. Though it feels more like Hard Rock, you can hear the roots in Melodic Power Metal still there. The album has a pretty much a classic sheen. You’ll find your catchy belters there such as the opener ‘Heaven Is Calling’ and ‘Eyes Of A Stranger’ as best examples with the latter being more interesting with a more outstanding riffs and lyrics. ‘Don’t Dream’ is your ballad moment here but it’s dragging on boring unfortunately, letting the stronger impression of the first part of the album sink down a bit; I’ve been trying to wait for its redemptive moment, but it just didn’t come.
The next song is also trying to move you emotively and it’s slightly more appealing with a catchy chorus than its predecessor, but it is too far close to cheesy and drags on too. ‘Saviour’ couldn’t come sooner enough; leaning towards speed and some neo-classical HM turns it definitely picks up the album back. ‘Tokyo’ (a cover song) can be remarked on guitar solos and work but not much else. The closing ‘Things I’ve Never Needed’ is again a slow song, but a lot better than the slower moments before, thanks to it being more stripped down, acoustic and less cheesy with lyrics, which come out less as trying but feel bit more genuine and probably would have been more powerful if there was a better build up in sequencing the songs. A good and enjoyable album and fans of the band should be glad to see them back on form.
Tracklist
01. Heaven Is Calling
02. Facing Your Enemy
03. Eyes Of A Stranger
04. Fear No Evil
05. Live & Learn
06. Don’t Dream
07. See Me Crying
08. Saviour
09. Tokyo
10. March Of The Dwarf
11. Fame And Fortune
12. Things I Never Needed
Line-up
Rick Altzi – vocals
Olaf Lenk – guitars
Chris Hill – bass
Casey Grillo – drums/studio//Tim Breideband/live (both to be replaced by Kevin Kott)
Websites
http://at-vance.olaflenk.com/www12/home12.htm / http://www.myspace.com/atvance
Cover Picture
Rating
Music: 7.5
Sound: 7.5
Total: 7.5 / 10
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