Seventh Avenue - Between The Worlds
Massacre Records
Melodic Power / Speed Metal
12 songs (66'24)
Release year: 2003
Seventh Avenue, Massacre Records
Reviewed by Marty
Seventh Avenue has actually existed since the early 90's and this release, Between The Worlds is the band's fourth full length album to date. Bad decisions as far as promotion and choice of label for this German band has really hurt their career. Now that the band has signed with Massacre Records, let's hope they get the promotion and support from this label and that their career can finally make the big leap forward.

The music of this band can be described as classic German Power Metal and influences from Helloween, older Blind Guardian and Gamma Ray can be heard, with regularity, all through this album. Speedy Stratovarius style riffing and drumming is also a staple of many songs on this release. There's lots of killer riffs, lightning fast double bass drumming and shredding leads to satisfy any Speed Metal fan. The Hammerfall style of 80's-like harmonized guitar riffs make appearances on a few tracks as well. Vocalist Herbie Langhans has a voice that varies from an attempted Michael Kiske style to a more raspier Andi Deris-like quality. The music is exciting and has lots of great instrumental breaks that get pretty wild as far as the speed and the soloing. A few tracks suffer from a little too much diversity. Many tempo and rhythmic changes really disrupt the flow and sometimes you forget which track you're listening to until the main riff or chorus comes back in. Several tracks seem to suffer from just being speedy, double bass drum soaked guitar riff-fests that really don't develop into anything unique or memorable for that matter.

Album highlights include the instrumental Storm which features some great thematic riffing and excellent drumming. Lots of tempo changes to a slower heavier style mix thing up a bit and results in a solid song. Angel's Eyes is a spirited and more mid-tempo track with a solid up-front guitar sound and lots of harmonic fills. Great harmonized vocals and a catchy chorus add the finishing touches. Until You Come Again begins with an acoustic guitar passage that is very similar to You Can't Kill Rock And Roll from Ozzy's Diary Of A Madman album. The song quickly shifts gears into heavier Running Wild or Saxon style with a great galloping beat. One Life Ends, a 9 minute opus, features some great thematic guitar riffing using harmony thirds to create the typical Iron Maiden dramatic effect that is a staple of many of their greatest songs. The vocal style on this one really brings Rolf Kasparek (Rock 'n Rolf) (Running Wild) to mind. A cover version of Survivor's (remember "Eye Of The Tiger"?) Burning Heart is also included here in this package. It's a decent cover and gets the full treatment complete with a more double bass style drumming.

Overall, this is a great sounding band. The only problem is that there are so many bands around now that have this same sound that there's very little here that even hints at originality. Some of the tracks are far too long and suffer from poor arranging. With the sometimes chaotic structure to some of the songs, you start to loose interest in them. All the elements are there, they just need some fine tuning with the presentation of their songs. There's lots of other bands out there playing this style, some are better and some are far worse. Seventh Avenue are above average, especially compared to some of the newcomers in the Melodic Speed/Power Metal scene. This is a decent album and one that fans who must have every album in the Power/ Speed Metal genre will find enjoyable.

Killing Songs :
Storm, Angel's Eyes, Until You Come Again and One Life Ends
Marty quoted 72 / 100
Other albums by Seventh Avenue that we have reviewed:
Seventh Avenue - Terium reviewed by Chris and quoted 91 / 100
0 readers voted
Average:
 0
You did not vote yet.
Vote now

There are no replies yet to this review
Be the first one to post a reply!