lista zespołów Heavy Rock MoonMadness All in Between

Let me introduce you to MoonMadness, one of the nice young bands of Finland, and their debut album, All in Between, one of the nice CDs – as I usually say, a disc for traveling. One of the nice ones. Not more.
The album starts with the short, promising intro "On The Air". Next comes a sharp, rocking song, "Stroke of Midnight": driving and quite typical for the band. It all the time promises something, but doesn't give enough power, enough creativity.

You know, sometimes there are albums on the edge: if it would be a little bit better, you'd call it good, if a bit worse – bad, but instead it's somewhere between – it's just nice. All in Between is an album of that kind. At first sight they have everything to make it – they are amazing musicians. Vocalist Heidi has an interesting, clean, deep voice, and she can express a lot. The band has a good image, and they did a good booklet, with fine photos. But.... Maybe there's always some "but" in a debut album…. This CD lacks something. I can't say that the songwriting is bad – it's definitely not bad. Songs differ from each other; the album is not boring. You can hear pretty melodies, driving rhythms, quite good sound and overall production. They definitely rock, these young Finnish workers of the music industry. They combine different influences, touches of different styles (you can notice both hard rock [e.g., "On The Edge Of Madness"] and power metal [like "Shot Through The Wing" or "Thunder"]), and it creates a specific atmosphere, which can become unique in the future, if the musicians develop their style. MoonMadness carefully choose sounds, and they succeed. I'd particularly like to mention keyboard work, which is interesting and colourful.

But the melodies are not catchy enough to call "excellent"; the vocal lines are too steady and plain. In songs sometimes you wait something – some unexpected turn, sudden change, surprise step - but the musicians follow more classic rules of song structure. The guitar work is too standard. In some songs you can recognize to what classic bands the musicians listen, what music they like, and I should I admit they have good influences, but they don't have yet enough of themselves. The ballad "Victims Of The Moon" stands out a bit and gives a more bright feeling and impression, though still I believe that MoonMadness can do more and better.

So in the end I can write just a standard phrase: let's see what MoonMadness will do next, because they have good potential.