| CD REVIEW Electric Earth – Elegantly Wasted – Ferreira - FireWölfe |
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TSM/SLW Promotions special, September 2011, Part 3 : Electric Earth – Elegantly Wasted – Ferreira - FireWölfe This time, one Swedish band (Electric Earth) and three from the US (Elegantly Wasted from Los Angeles, CA, Ferreira from NYC, and FireWölfe from several parts in the US), with somewhat divergent musical styles...even if things stay well within the “Rock” boundaries. ----------------------------------------------------- A short story to explain where the title of this new Electric Earth album comes from. A couple of months following the 2007 release of this Trollhättan (that village is situated West in South-Sweden, some 70 km NNE from Göteborg) based Swedish Grunge-Stoner band's sophomore album Vol. II – Words Unspoken (review by yours truly posted on 28/05/2007) through Belgian cult label Mausoleum, Electric Earth released the limited edition EP Selling Souls, including two new songs as well as a couple of chosen covers (Kiss's “I Want You”and Led Zeppelin's “Heartbreaker”) featuring special guests Mattias “Ia” Eklund (Freak Kitchen) and Zak Tell (Clawfinger). October of that same year saw the release of the sophomore album in North-America, and at the same time the band's debut album was g-finally made available globally (thanks to a distribution deal with the Swedish MusicSpot). In November Music Resource Group nominated EE as one of 5 bands for the 7th annual Independent Music Awards in the category Best Hard Rock/ Metal Album with their sophomore album. Things were goin' great for the band...but then tragedy struck on a very personal level, when singer/ rhythm guitarist Peter Gottlieb's wife Jenny was diagnosed with cancer. After giving it a hefty fight, she regretfully died in March 2009. The situation, along with a couple of operations, and children, put the band on a really low profile for almost 3 years, but eventually the band members' love for their music helped 'em overcome all the hardship after having “touched the void”. Well, that clarifies the title, right? I'm not sure whether you I can actually call Touching The Void a concept album, but a number of the songs on this album relate very much to the things Gottlieb went through, including his doubt in a merciful God figure, apparently. Material for what ought to be a very nice album, but occasionally the singer doés whine in a slightly repetitive manner about his grievances against the “Almighty” (personally, I've always found it funny how some people will tell you that certain things happen as a test to those who “remain behind”...but when they themselves are “tested”, they will rebel against and sometimes even refute their former beliefs? I could go on about that topic, but wouldn't want to start a forum on the subject with usually too touchy and fatalistic people – not that those will be logging onto this website too often, I guess!). But I also don't wanna sound too negative about the album, because it doés have quite some nice songs among its 14 tracks (which total almost 55 ½ minutes in length). You can listen to a threesome of songs off the new album (along with 10 songs off the other 2 albums) at the band's own site (www.) electricearth1.com. Hum...what? (consulting my inner voice here) Oh yeah...you might find it interesting to know that some of the songs got additional keyboards, played by one Martin Klem (recording and mixing engineer of the album), and one Matthias Wellhag wrote the string arrangements to the album's title track. The album's producer (and mastering engineer) Jonas Beijer then added the intermissions and programmed sounds. Just to be complete, Beijer (alongside one Jörgen Einarsson) were responsible for additional backing vocals. 82/100 ----------------------------------------------------- From Sweden to Hollywood, California, where 4 musicians from around the globe formed the Rock act Rock-n-Roll Sound. In early 2003 two of those people (singer/ guitarist Lenny J and guitarist/ backing singer Queen D) decided to turn a new leaf, and founded the band known as Elegantly Wasted. Seeing as the duo had their musical ideas set for a while already, the band's self-released album Greetings From Strange Place already saw the light of day in December of the same year (actually, the band only did 3 gigs prior to the album release party, so they had enough time getting it recorded). Getting good reviews in both the US and Europe, the band made its first actual tour in Switzerland (I guess they kinda had an extended holiday, because they were there for 12 gigs played between March 18 and April 17, 2004), and continued to promote the album with loose gigs in their hometown neighborhood throughout the rest of the year and up to late July 2004. In September the band again toured in Europe for the latter part of the month, playing a total of 6 Swiss, 2 German, and 2 more Swiss gigs in early October. The band's fans were eager to find the sophomore album in the stores, but that didn't happen until 2007, after writing sessions during 2006...year during which the band only played gigs on home turf (never traveling further than San Francisco). Early 2007 saw the release of Desolation Row (again recorded with Howard Karp, whom had previously worked with such noted artists as Papa Roach, Jimmy Eat World and Audioworld), and following another local album release party on March 1st, and one in the Swiss Interlaken area the day after, EW returned towards the end of that month to play 3 German gigs and Switzerland between March 29 and April 14 (mostly returning to venues they'd already been before). The guys returned at the end of May for 4 festivals in Germany and Switzerland (personally, I'm beginning to think one of 'em has a family member in Switzerland, and what the band does is take European holidays, playing gigs as best as can be arranged), and in September finally set out for a short US (couple of dates in New York, Ohio, Kansas, and Texas), and the year was ended with some mre local LA shows. That's also where they started the year 2008, but late June and early July the guys also played three Ohio and one Pennsylvania show. They finished the year with a 4th...or was it 5th?...trip to Europe, paying 6 Swiss and 2 German shows from Sept. 25 to Oct. 11. End 2008 saw the band announce that they were gearing up to write and record new material in the next year, and were therefore slowing down live action to a minimum. I guess that's about when Lenny J and Queen D were left rhythm section-less, as both bassist and drummer departed. Well, time to reflect somewhat on things, I suppose, and during 2010 both remaining members got to do some interesting side-projects individually. Lenny J made his debut on the White Screen, playing the guitarist in Russel Brand's band Infant Sorrow in the 2010 comedy movie Get Him To The Greek...and Queen D traveled to Iraq to entertain the troops as part of the all-female AC/DC tribute band Thundherstruck. But eventually the two came back to their first love, their own band, and after recruiting new members Mickey Westcott (bass) and Adel Vallejo (drums), the band set forth to start the writing process for their 3rd album. In anticipation of the full-length, the band already treated its fans to a video for the new song “Tattoos And Memories”... ...which you can find on both the band's own website (www.) elegantlywasted.com and at (www.) myspace.com/elegantlywasted, alongside several songs off the band's previous two albums (combining the 2 you get a total of 7 songs, 4 of which are off Desolation Row). What you'll find when listening to that material, according to the band itself, are tunes that fall somewhere in between Foo Fighters, Guns 'n' Roses, and Stone Temple Pilots (an assessment to which I concur...nothing more to say – except that whomever plays the leads in the guitar tandem, occasionally comes up with some pretty jiffy note associations...also, I seem to prefer the songs in which Queen D also does the backing vocals). 88/100 ----------------------------------------------------- New York based guitarist Marco Ferreira is a guy whom apparently likes to keep busy. Besides working with Ferreira (more about that later), he's been part of French Prog Rock band Ventura since 2006, when he traveled to France to record their debut album The New Kingdom (released by the Finnish Lion Music label). Second album Hybrid (this time recorded in Switzerland) followed in 2008, released as CD/DVD with a live performance of the band for Swiss TV network TSR following. In 2007 he also started the band Goodbye Thrill with guitarist Dean Cramer, and that same year UK label Kivel Records released the band's self-titled debut album. The band played a couple of shows, including a performance at the first Melodic Rock Fest in South Bend, Indiana (where they shared the stage with the likes of Eric Martin of Mr. Big fame, Nelson, Survivor, Nightranger, Joe Lynn Turner, Jeff Scott Soto, Mark Slaughter, and others). 2010 saw the release of its follow-up Keepsakes (released as CD/DVD, again through Kivel Records) as well as 3rd album Outrageous. The band again played some shows, including the South Dakota Fest (alongside Skid Row, LA Guns, Bret Michaels, Enuff Z'Nuff, Firehouse, and Dokken...whom they again supported later on a Massachusetts show. GBT was also invited to play at the second Melodic Rock Fest, this time supporting Y&T, Winger, Danger Danger, Trixter, and others. But even before all those things which would already look impressive on a musician's cv happened, Marco started the band Ferreira with his drummer/ backing singer brother Alex. With a selections of Hard Rock tunes which fall in the vein of Harem Scarem, Ratt, Queen, and Journey, the band released its debut album Fallen Heroes in 2002 through Shire Records. With all the action in between, the brothers didn't get about bringing out a new album until 2009, when Working Overtime was released through the band's own Playrec Productions imprint. Definitely in a prolific songwriting mood, Marco managed to write the material for the band's 3rd release Better Run...this one released in 2010 through Escape Music. This is 2011, and Ferreira (or, at least the brothers, because Marco also plays all bass except on one track – and there's no trace left of the extra guitarist and bassist Marco had felt so strong about on the band's 2010 album) is back with its 4th album Are You In? Well, as the introduction suggests, and as one can check for oneself (by listening to the songs posted at the band's official website (www.) reverbnation.com/ferreira (as well as on Marco's MySpace page (www.) myspace.com/marcferr), the music Ferreira makes is a melodic Heavy Rock with some Glam influences (and the occasional acoustic side-tracking, as in the instrumental “She's Building A Fairy House”, as well as the odd '70s psychedelic track “Manner's Song”), as once so popular in the mid to late '80s! In fact, if such bands as Dokken, Great White, TNT, and so many others (the list really goes on so long) were among your daily musical food in those days, I warmly recommend you check this band out (as well as Marco's other musical outlets), which has after all the added advantage of having brother singing together (due to their somewhat similar voices, them singing together usually happens in very harmonic way). 91/100 ----------------------------------------------------- Oh well, in the case of FireWölfe I would have to say the music is Heavy rather than Rock, so here's a deviation from this special's intro. Now...how about a questions-and-answers game? Question 1 : What gave the spark to the existence of this band? Question 2 : Who? Question 3 : So, what happened during and after said conversation? Question 4 : What does FireWölfe sound like? End conclusion? While not exactly a threat to the major league of bands in the Classic Melodic Heavy Metal genre, I can see this outfit (providing they complete that line-up, or get themselves a hired hand for the occasion) being picked by some of 'em as warm-up act! 88/100 Tony. P.S. : A 4th special for September 2011 is already in the making, as we speak...and the material at Casa Tony will provide two more. I hope to get that done in time before the end of the month, and also that the editor-in-chief will be able to post 'em asap. |
