If you’ve heard any of At Vance’s past offerings, you won’t be surprised by anything you find on Ride the Sky. The 11 tracks here are competently done but not very exciting pieces of fairly generic melodic/power metal. It’s not their best work. It’s not completely awful. It’s just kind of there.
There are moments scattered throughout the record. Olaf Lenk’s main riff on “Torn – Burning Like Fire” is nice, and he offers up some tasty neoclassical noodling here and there, particularly on the opening of “End of Days.” I also like the Celtic-influenced riff of “Salvation Day” which brings an almost folk metal sound to the band. Even in the better moments, though, singer Rick Altzi’s seeming desire to be David Coverdale often weakens the tunes.
For me, one of the most interesting moments on the record is their cover of Free’s “Wishing Well.” Granted Altzi’s vocals on the track are rough, but at least the bluesy ‘70s hard rock sound offers something a little different in an album of sameness.
Ultimately, there’s not much I can say about Ride the Sky, other than, for the most part, it sounds like dozens of other melodic/power metal records you’ve heard before. It’s not a horrible record, but it’s completely forgettable.
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Yeah, I thought it was pretty meh and unmemorable too..
on Mar 26th, 2010 at 09:09I haven’t listened to At Vance since Only Human-and as I recall, their cover of Rainbow’s “I Surrender” was the most interesting thing on that. Spotting a trend here.
on Mar 26th, 2010 at 23:13One should be a true fan to like what they do. I am, so find any of their offerings quite interesting.However, this album is indeed way less memorable than VII or Chained. The point here is not Rick Altzi, who I consider to be a pretty powerful singer and a good substitute for Mats Leven, but the fact that Olaf Lenk came up with rather uninspired material this time. Hope their next one will be much better.
on Jul 2nd, 2010 at 00:08