Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Artist: Coldspell
Label: Escape Music
Release: 2013
Running time: 57:44
Rating: 5/5
“Frozen Moment” is the third studio album from Swedish melodic hard rock revivalists Coldspell, who hail from Kiruna (Uppsala), and it’s honestly unbelievable to see how this band improves with every new record, successfully taking another artistic step up along its evolutionary path. It’s by far their strongest yet. That doesn’t mean the debut »Infinate Stargaze« (2009) and its follow-up »Out in the Cold« (2011) were bad, not by a long shot. They earned great reviews, and thanks to them Coldspell found themselves among the handful of most promising young melodic hard rock bands. Especially, if I may whisper, since this came in more than handy after the retirement of the legendary Treat. With their third album, Coldspell step firmly into a spot that at least partly fills the gap the scene was left with after Treat’s premature retirement (I still believe it’s just a longer break). But like I said: anyone who knows bands like 220Volt, Treat, Renegade, Dalton, etc… that is, the groups of the melodic hard rock scene that grew and developed in Sweden around the turn of the eighties into the nineties, will quickly connect the artistic parallels in Coldspell’s songwriting.
The Swedish perfectionists have once again masterfully repackaged the legacy of the big »Scandi hard rock« scene. For the new album they kept the experienced Danish producer Tommy Hansen in the studio, and they delivered by far the most interesting record of their career in terms of variety of ideas. You won’t find an artistic misfire on it. There isn’t one. Every song »stands up«, and as compositions they deliver an outstanding melodic, atmospheric payoff. The band knows exactly where to place the peak of the gradual build-up of mood in each song. In the chorus. And that’s exactly how »Frozen Paradise« unfolds. The album has a predatory, hypnotic touch of doomy drama, even a theatrical, »mildly villainous« gloom borrowed from the golden legacy of the Dio era of Rainbow, or the Dio/Martin era of Black Sabbath. The guitar work is a true rhapsody in blue. A brilliance you can only call the uncompromising perfectionism of the real Scandinavian school, the way it was founded long ago by great masters from Y.J Malmsteen all the way to Kee Marcello. The orientally spiced Life Has Just Began takes on the Staregazer/Perfect Strangers theater, which then pops up again, more obviously, in the closing Legacy. It’s a typical trick that many Scandinavian bands love to use. Because they know full well it’ll hit with full force. So with »Frozen Paradise«, Coldspell have delivered an album that »par exellence« repackaged and re-served things that have already been said, and did it effectively. It’s a sly replica of a sweet so good that it almost hurts.
The album offers a range of different songs. A track like Life 2 Live, with its clearly pronounced symbolism of a bright AOR moment, is a perfect buddy for heavy rotation on the radio! A bomb of a song that simply has to come out as a hit single. Maybe even with a video. Then there’s the dangerous, ultra-cranked, stomping On the Run, which carries the rest of the album on in a metallic light, and even brings in the double bass drum pedals, otherwise a genre trademark of metal. The second half of the album won’t give you a moment to catch your breath either. There’s only one direction here. Outrageous bombast that gives you goosebumps from start to finish and sends every hair on your body standing at attention! All that bombast comes from a one-of-a-kind combination of pompous, infectious chorus melodies and a “ruffled, contrasty” production, handled by the master Tommy Hansen. Soldiers is an outstanding rocker, with a cunningly built-in charging Celtic flourish (I’m talking about the military march), something that might catch the attention of fans of Gary Moore from the days of his »Wild Frontier« album.
It’s no secret that Coldspell are damn well cranked up in the production department. That touch of gloom, combined with the cranked-up riff production, clearly shows them flirting with heavy metal. If you remember last year’s release by their countrymen Eclipse, titled »Bleed And Scream«, which is also a work of great perfection, Eclipse too occasionally veered into harder, more metallic waters, but the other parallel with Eclipse is mainly the vocals of Niklas Swedentorp, who in many ways recalls Erik Martensson (Eclipse). Niklas is outstanding at blending explosive passion with big vocal melodies. His clean, punchy-in-every-register voice delivers plenty of melodic dominance and, with his infectious delivery, pulls the listener right into the heart of the magic of »Frozen Paradise«! From there it’s not far to sensible comparisons with the vocal delivery of Joey Tempest (Europe) in their golden days and Robert Ernlund (Treat). The vocals are the needle on the scale, delivering one of the key qualities that lifts all the songwriting foundations of this album to the level of full authorial brilliance. The kind of brilliance that any band in 2013 can actually hope to reach. A band that’s forced to repackage »already invented things« and serve them up again so that they’re 100% going to spark for the thousand-and-first time. And that’s an art too, one that only the best have mastered. And with »Frozen Paradise« Coldspell prove they’ve become true masters at it and that, with this new record, they’ve handed in their artistic doctorate! This is one of the best melodic hard rock releases of the year! An album without a single weak moment. An album of magic and flawless compositional brilliance. Classic Scandinavian pedigree.
Lineup
Niklas Swedentorp – vocals
Michael Larsson — guitar, backing vocals
Matti Eklund — keyboards, backing vocals
Anders «Kebbe» Lindmark — bass guitar
Perra Johanson — drums
Production
Tommy Hansen
Tracklist
01. Paradise (5:20)
02. Angel of the World (4:09)
03. Life Has Just Begun (5:05)
04. Goin All the Way (4:04)
05. Alive (4:28)
06. Life 2 Live (5:28)
07. On the Run (4:39)
08. Soldiers (5:55)
09. Fallin (4:05)
10. Dark Reflections (4:42)
11. Legacy (5:08)
12. Rise And Fall* (4:20)
*… bonus track
