Sonic Station
Next Stop

Next stop for Sonic Station is the second album by this Swedish band, called simply Next Stop. Clever title, you may think. Cover art is quite nice although the girl seem to be a bit in a rush or over-conscious about the time. But one has to wonder where this next stop will take us. According to the press information it leads towards a higher focus on the AOR side and the more powerful tunes. A highly anticipated album they claim, I didn’t anticipate it as I didn’t find the debut too interesting, it was really good in its best parts but quite anonymous.

This album is similar in style, quite soft AOR, some might call it westcoast. I think you can liken them with a band like Chicago. They have male and female singer something that adds a touch of variation to an album already quite varied between the softer parts and the more powerful parts. As I stated not very powerful. The production is quite excellent though, modern and with excellent sound. The vocalists are very good as well but also fairly typical of the genre both the male and female vocalist. Although I would claim that they belong amongst the top singers of the genre. We are treated to eleven tracks on this album and a playing time of around fifty minutes, maybe a tad long I would say.

It is a quality production, no doubt about that. Very strong sound, excellent production and overall a strong musical presence. The best tracks are also impressive, but too bad they are not in a majority because most of the tracks are good but they are fairly bland as well. The best tracks are amazing but as I said more than half of the album doesn’t really do anything for me. I think that is a bit of a shame as there is heaps of potential here, potential to do something really amazing but this album is only amazing in short blasts and when it is not amazing it is quite anonymous.

An album that could have been so much more but the most amazing things on the album I have to say is the female voiced Hide and Seek that ends the album as well as the third track Brighter After Dark which is the brightest shining light of this album. Those two tracks are amazing. And then we have the opening part of songs which is also quite excellent, but unfortunately it all ends there as most of the album is a bland reminder of what kind of musical world we live in. But still, overall it is a good album, just not as good as it could have been.

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