Pearls & Flames
Reliance

Pearls & Flames is a debuting album from the Sundsvall area in Sweden, a band with lots of experience from other bands like Lion’s Share, Coastland Ride, and a lot more. They didn’t make the best cover art for their debut album they call Reliance, and Pearls & Flames is a pretty dismal name for a band as well. Fortunately, it is not about names or artworks, but about the songs and the overall feeling of the album, so how about it?

Well, they fit in the AOR/westcoast category of the music style, catchy, melodic, polished, and they aren’t particularly original in any sense of the way. The singer is typical of the genre, and the fact is that it feels familiar even before I have heard a full song. That is a sensation that I do not like when taking on a new album, and it means that the songs has to be more than outstanding for the album to be anything but average. I think they have pretty good vocals, but why do they make the album 54 minutes long, that is way more than what is bearable when it comes to the AOR genre. Did I mention a bit repetitive?

The songs of this album are rather good, there is no denying that. The catch is that at least 40% of the albums that get to me are at least pretty good, probably 60%, so you need to do a lot more than pretty good in the AOR style if you want to stand out. And they don’t. They don’t do anything more than pretty good, or stand out, it is pretty typical of the genre, it is fine to listen to but as memorable as a drop of water in the ocean. I found it nice to listen to the songs, but none of them remains with me when I turn of the album, like now when I have one more paragraph to write and changed to the next album in the music library, now I cannot recall anything from this album more than I kind of liked listening to it – does that sound like a great album?

Average AOR, perhaps slightly above average, but nothing more than a rating in the middle and a note about a rather pointless release. I kind of prefer really bad albums compared with these as these are so many and so dull that anytime I work with these kinds of albums I think about putting Hallowed to rest forever – the enjoyable albums are those that dare to be different, follow the pack is just boring – as this album, it is good but also boring.

HHHHHHH