| CD REVIEW Impulsia |
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Band : Impulsia Originally Impulsia is/ was a studio Melodic Hard Rock/ Heavy AOR project originated by main composer & guitarist/ additional keyboardist Uno Sjöström (played with sevveral Swedish bands during the ‘80s and ‘90s, including Sollefteá in the North of his country), former Candlemass singer Johan Langquist (whom taught up the project’s current name, originally it was Impuls), and Royal Hunt guitarist (also producer and keyboardist) Marcus Jidell. In that first sentence, I use the terms “originally” and “is/ was”, because apparently they’ve already graced a few stages as a band with guests as well. Which immediatelly drops the “guest” term, and oh my, there’s quite a few on this disc! Let’s start our look at ‘em chronologically. The album opens with “Flying Away”, a solo guest vocal performance for none less than Robin Beck (not only a celebrated solo artist, but also the wife of House Of Lords frontman James Christian), whom comes back in a lead vocal capacity on the tracks “Alone” and “Seas To Cross”, and also provides vocal backings (alongside James Christian) on the latter, as well as on “Too Many Heartaches”. On that same first song also a guest performance on cello by Rolf Jidell. Next lead guest vocalist is one Anneli ‘Pandora’ Magnusson (apparently quite a personality in Sweden), singing in duet with Langquist on “Oceans Of Love”. Further female vocals come from one Katarina Leifsdotter, apparently a music student which Uno discovered. Instrumentally, the guys get backing on these recordings by the recently deceased Marcel Jacob (Talisman, etc…) on bass (having had health problems for a long time, he eventually took his own life) and drummer Thomas Broman (known from activities with Glenn Hughes and Mischael Schenker) on most of the songs (Richard Netterman playing drums on the tracks “Oceans Of Love” and “Too Many Heartaches”, both recorded at another studio than Marcus Jidell’s), and further guests can be found in guitarist Tommy Denander (on the Bleusey “Slow Down”,and “Too Many Heartaches”; Denander brought the trio in contact with Beck), guitarist Dave Martone (on album closing instrumental “River Of Tears”), and eventualy pianist Victoria Theodore (on the songs “Alone” and “Too many Heartaches”, both being ballads, of course – Victoria is a celebrated San Fransisco artist, who’s accompanied Stevie Wonder on his 2008 tour). A bonus guest performance came when Pontus Norgren (Hammerfall) whom acted as mixer and co-producer, let Uno know that he’d added a solo to the album’s instrumental. The material on the album is a mixture of songs written in 1989, 1994, and in 2008, and if you’d like to know more about their background, check out Uno’s page at myspace.com/unosjostrom, where you can also find not only demos to 3 of the album’s songs, but also 7 songs as they appear on the album. 2 Additional tracks (and a couple of others overlapping what you found on that other MySpace page) can be found at myspace.com/impulssweden...but what you’ll nót find is an mp3 file of this band’s cover of Derek And The Dominos’ classic hit “Layla” (written by Eric Clapton). Plenty of the songs can be viewed on video, by the way (on either of the 2 pages)! I’m sure you’ll find it all to be high quality stuff, and the necessity to buy this album depends on whether you’ve enough money to buy yet another quality product in this genre (I have to say, in the last couple of years the scene has grown quite a bit, with lots of albums available by many artists, both new and veteran), or on how much you’re a fan of either of the persons involved! Just to get back to my remark (made at the end of paragraph one) of the project also coming out as a band, the album presentation in late June 2009 was done with Beck, Christian, Magnusson, Broman, and Jacob (actually, it was his very last performance). Broman has remained, and one Jorgen Zalbert was recruited on the bass, and the band apparently performs with two other female singers. reportedly, the trio is already working at a new album (tentative title Impressions). 87/100 Tony |