2013
Back on February 4th I posted this album (and did a brief review of it) as part of my "Free Metal Monday" series. Since then the guys in The Rockford Heroes were kind enough to e-mail me so I could "fill in the blanks" some. At the time of the original review I was stumbling around in the dark with this band as very little information was to be found. You can read the first review below if you so desire, but this one will be a little more in-depth. This is actually the band's 3rd release. Here's the details straight from the band:
"We have always said that we shouldn't do any full length releases (rather shorter releases, but often) and had planned to do another EP. But this time it didn't happen. When the songs for what should have been an EP was finished, we noticed how good they fitted together with the songs from the previous release "The White EP". And even though we got some really nice reviews, there haven't been that many listeners. So, we worked further with the old songs, re-recorded some parts, and re-mixed it to fit with the new songs. And this became Edge of the silverthorn, which we are very satisfied with"
So, there you have it as far as the background goes on this, the bands first (of hopefully many to come), full-length album. The band itself was formed by vocalist Dan Hultstrand and guitarist Jonas Arvidsson (formerly of VII Gates) and really does cover a lot of ground on this album. The shift in styles could be attributed to these songs being from two different sources, but I suspect it has more to do with the fact that these guys just like to keep things fresh and interesting. In a very broad sense you could call this band a hard rock/heavy metal outfit. The things is that's a rather generic description. As I listened to these 8 songs again (I put them on as I was typing this up) two things popped into my head. The first is that these songs are really strong. The second thing is how short this release is. At not even 40 minutes it just speeds by. That's a shame. From the moment album opener "No Reason To Believe" kicks in you're treated to a splendid album of melodic hard rock ("No Reason To Believe"), Queen-like pomp ("The Day Of Return" and "Gold Encircles The Altar") and even some NWOBHM meets Rainbow ("Capricious Arrows"). There's ballad's like the AOR/melodic hard rock number "Forever" and even some Euro-style power rock in the quite good number "And Then There Was Temptation". Quite possibly my favorite cut (other then the well-written "No Reason To Believe") was "The Fool's Gold". Falling somewhere between Savatage and the more melodic side of the NWOBHM movement (Persian Risk, Praying Mantis, Tobruk, Shy, etc.). For a band that draws influences from a lot of different bands (listen and you'll here Skid Row, Rainbow, Rush, Kiss, Led Zeppelin, Kansas, Queen, Whitesnake and more!) they really have a very distinct sound. I look forward to hearing more from The Rockford Heroes. You can hear the whole album, read my initial review and even download it for free through the various links below.
The complete album as a play list on YouTube: http://tinyurl.com/aso4pxx
My initial review:
http://metalmark.blogspot.com/search?q=Free+Metal+Monday%3A+The+Rockford+Hereos-Edge+of+the+Silverthorn+
Download the album here:
http://www.therockfordheroes.com/
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