First Signal: First Signal
By Brianna Brackett
Release Date: September 14th, 2010 Record Label: Frontier My rating points:
First Signal is a Melodic Hard Rock band that just released their debut album, "First Signal" on Frontiers Records this year. This is like a celebration of Harry Hess returning to his roots during his times in the past project Harem Scarem and bass player Dennis Ward (Pink Cream 69, Place Vendome, Khymera) adding a nice collaboration between them both. Of course I had to research on both their past projects to see what I was getting myself into and how they've progressed in my generation of rockers of 2010. As I am learning to become a better reviewer and going through a lot in my own life at the age of twelve, I've noticed that I'm not the only one who gets writers block when it comes to my own writing. As I read up on First Signal, they used many different songwriters, like Tom and James Martin, Erik Martensson, Robert Sall, and Ronny Milianowicz and few others that helped created a concept album that I found appealing. The album opens up with a heavy melodic rock track, "This City" and after listening to it a few times myself I caught myself singing along with it and it sure rocked me out. It was a great song to choose for the beginning of the album. Hess' vocals are great. The second track "When You Believe" opens up with some nice keys by Eric Ragno. I would have loved to hear more of his keyboard playing just a little longer before the vocals begin. It's a nice opening for the song and has a little more melodic edge compared to the first track. You'll also take pleasure in Eric's playing on their power ballad, "Crazy". I also enjoyed the double layering of the backing vocals as it added a fastidious touch to this song. Many old school rockers will enjoy both "Goodbye To The Goodtime" and "First Signal" because is has that 80's hard rock edge and attitude that my grandmother loves to hear even to this day. I caught myself rocking away to their vibes they bring and caught my grandmother doing the same thing while I was listening to this release. As I was listening to "Feels Like Love This Time", I've realized that Hess has a lot of vocal abilities to grab any age of rockers to take a good listen to this album. My mouth dropped hitting the floor on the guitar solo done by Michael Klein in this song. Check out the other songs off this album, "Into The Night," "When November Falls," "Yesterdays Rain," and "Naked Desire." Naked Desire is the last track off the album giving us a good execution that completes this debut. These eleven tracks are simple to sing along with after a few listens. You'll notice that the chorus throughout each song pretty much repeats itself often and they become stuck in your mind even hours after listening to it. The song writing is solid from the beginning to the end with good musicianship, hooks and an admirable melodic hard rock experience that I went through on listening to this album. This album has a great support system from drummer Chris Schmidt and Darren Smith (ex-Harem Scarem) who contributed to the background vocals. As I open a new chapter in my life I hope First Signal will continue more chapters in theirs. For more rocking information visit Frontier Records. | ||||||||||||||
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