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Every new CD of JOURNEY seems to be mark in AOR history.
The particular album is heavily discussed all over the internet
and to each their own opinion of course. 12 years ago 'Trial
by fire' was a wonderful STEVE PERRY comeback album of JOURNEY,
which also received a favorable review from our side back
in 1996. 5 years later 'Arrival' was by far the best AOR album
of 2001. 'Generations' from 2005 was very disappointing and
seemed to show a band on it's way to the graveyard. Then what
happened in the following 3 years should actually not happen
to any band, because replacing your lead singer twice within
2 years is ridiculous. JOURNEY also had their TAPEGATE affair
with STEVE AUGERI and many more rumors, including the reason
why JEFF SCOTT SOTO was suddenly fired without telling him
face to face. Anyway, moving on forward to 2008 and the band
introduces a new singer called ARNEL PINEDA, a new CD and
a sound going straight back to the 1980s AOR sound of the
band. If you mix 'Arrival', 'Raised on radio' and 'Escape'
with 'Frontiers', then you have 'Revelations'. Sometimes the
songs are in the same unreachable AOR level of those albums,
but here and there are a few fillers too.
Nevertheless, the new JOURNEY CD will definitely become
one of the top AOR records of 2008, right next to a WORK OF
ART, H.E.A.T. and BROTHER FIRETRIBE. With a new lead singer
(number 6 when counting ROBERT FLEISCHMAN and GREGG ROLIE
from the early years) in the line-up, Arnel from the Philipines
(being the best STEVE PERRY imitator I have ever heard, yet
with sill an own vibrato as well as can be heard on the new
songs, especially on “What it takes to win”), a great production
of KEVIN SHIRLEY, a big WALLMART deal in the USA (2-CD and
1-DVD package for an insane low price), JOURNEY is ready to
make a huge impact and comeback with this 'Revelations' album.
Happily it's not as ballad-orientated as 'Trial by fire',
but even without STEVE PERRY it will have the same result
as 'Trial by fire' from 12 years ago, so a high chart entry
and a few singles being played on US Radio.
The European package has a bonustrack ("Let Me Take You
Back", an OK song) not on the US version, but you would rather
get the US version as this contains a full-blown recent Las
Vegas shot performance. One way or the other, the 2-CD set
is available for both of us. CD 1 is filled with new material,
while CD 2 is this new JOURNEY line-up doing remakes of JOURNEY
classics. Touching classics should be forbidden, but in this
case it has been done very well and JOURNEY are one of the
few major bands to re-record a full CD with their own tunes.
After last year's KEVIN CHALFANT JOURNEY Tribute CD, we can
now add a JOURNEY tribute by the band themselves. Back to
the new studio-CD, which is of course the main target here
to listen to. Well, this is JOURNEY at their very best, with
many amazing soon-to-be new AOR Classics, especially uptempo
rockers like "Never Walk Away" (RAISED ON RADIO Harmonyvocals,
the follow-up to "Be good to yourself"), "Change For The Better"
(a little like STEVE AUGERI period JOURNEY), "Where Did I
Lose Your Love" (instant AOR Classic, superb song, perhaps
AOR song of the year!) and "What It Takes To Win" (wow, this
does sound a whole lot like HARLAN CAGE, pure AOR).
These rockers are JOURNEY at their very best, reaching
classic 'Frontiers'/'Escape' level. Also the (semi) ballads
have the incredible high AOR level of 'Frontiers'/'Escape'
era, such as "After All These Years" (a definite number 1
hit candidate, the follow-up to "Faithfully", maybe AOR Ballad
of the year 2008, right next to WORK OF ART’s “Once in a lifetime”
one of the few new AOR ballads that hit the spot on the exact
right place!), "What I Needed" ("Mother, Father" style) and
the THE STORMish "Turn Down The World Tonight". So these are
in total 7 super sensational pure AOR tunes, showing that
JOURNEY is alive and well, with this fantastic new lead singer,
ARNEL PINEDA. Remaining tracks are a slight let-down, because
"Like A Sunshower" is a 'nothing special' soft ballad, "Wildest
Dream" is quite a good heavy rocker, but a grower as the chorus
fails a bit, "Faith In The Heartland" is a remake of the same
song JOURNEY recorded on 'Generations' and finally, the instrumental
"The Journey (Revelation)" does not make much sense.
In the end what we have here is probably the best selling
AOR album since 2001's JOURNEY's 'Arrival' and happily it
is a very sensational AOR album too! JOURNEY shows how the
big boys do it and with a first week sales of 100,000+ in
the USA alone by far the most successful pure AOR album since
JOURNEY released 'Trial by fire', so better make sure you
get this gem asap... The future looks bright for JOURNEY,
although you never know what to expect considering the fact
their lead singer has been replaced twice within a few years,
but for now JOURNEY STRIKES BACK BIG TIME, so better get this
2-CD (in Europe) or 2-CD/1-DVD (in the USA) set asap!
(Points: 9.2 out of 10)
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