Label: Frontiers Music Srl.
Release date: 9. 10. 2020
Production: Adam Stewart
Album length: 50.48 min
Genre: Melodic Rock / AOR
Rating: 7.0/10
The AOR and melodic rock revival is still kicking, and it doesn’t come exclusively from the Scandinavian corner of the world. Sometimes a band like this pops up in Hungary, too. Stardust, a pretty predictable name, formed five years ago, and their self-titled EP impressed the A&R folks at the Italian label Frontiers Music Srl. so much that the label signed them.
The guys certainly haven’t been sitting on their hands. Emboldened and brimming with creative energy, they got down to writing material for their studio debut, with a highway that leads straight to heartbreak. The album title hints at what the listener can easily guess about the content. Exactly what I wrote in the opening sentence of this review.
For the making of the debut, the band brought on board two very experienced musicians who lived and breathed the eighties, and who are also good old acquaintances of Frontiers Music Srl. Both were already active back when AOR was at the peak of its commercial success. The first is keyboardist Mark Spiro, the second guitarist Tommy Denander. With backing like that, it’s hard to go wrong. Let me say a bit more about the musical background of these two seasoned veterans. Keyboards and guitar may be their primary instruments, but both are of course multi-instrumentalists and producers, as well as very skilled songwriters and arrangers.
Both of them helped the band shape the songs and arrangements, and Denander also tossed in a guitar solo or two. The band leans heavily on an old-school sound of synth shimmer that comes across polished, as if straight out of the eighties. In the production, that sound sits more or less on equal footing with the contrasting guitar phrasing, and that’s where most of the musical value of the songs and the record is built. Adam Stewart’s vocals – it’s clear the Hungarian musicians took on stage names in the hope of being more likable and palatable – are the biggest draw of this debut. He doesn’t skimp on convincing (passionate and heartfelt) delivery, and the singer also flirts rather skillfully with soul stylings, as hinted at in the song Eye to Eye.
Still, moments of the album suffer far too obviously from blandness and a songwriting formula that’s been sold too many times already, like in the overly sugary ballad Perfect Obsession, and that feeling creeps in right from the start, when the chorus of Runaway kicks in. There are too many tracks and the album is too long. The trap of the predictable songwriting recipe took its rookie toll here. These are certainly talented musicians with a clear vision and goal. Given that this is a debut that is without a doubt a credible foundation for the band’s career, it’s fair to believe they’ll grow in maturity and artistry as they go. The guitar sound is glossy in the production and mostly aimed at balancing with the keyboards, while the vocals definitely stand out in this whole bold debut story. »Highway to Heartbreak«, which tells you in the title what the lyrics are chewing over, is a potentially welcome addition to the musical menu for all fans of the genre, worth checking out, but for now it won’t raise any eyebrows.
Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Tracklist:
1. Runaway
2. Heartbreaker
3. Bullet To My Heart
4. Perfect Obsession
5. 2Nd Hand Love
6. Shout It Out
7. Can’t Stop Loving You
8. Eye To Eye
9. Hey Mother
10. Blue Jeans Eyes (bonus track)
11. The River Is Rollin’
Lineup:
Adam Stewart – vocals, guitar
Facey – guitar, backing vocals
Dave Legrand – keyboards
Ben Martin – bass guitar, backing vocals
Tim Keeley – drums
