Crystal Ball: Crysteria

Swiss melodic metal / hard rock outfit Crystal Ball are set to release their 11th studio album Crysteria on January 28 via Massacre Records.

It’s a little bit embarrassing for me to be reviewing this album as a first-time listener to Crystal Ball -a band with 10 previous albums and over 3 decades of history, but C'est la vie.

The album gets down to business with what is my favourite track on the album ‘What Part of No’. I really like this track. Chuggy riffs, prominent keys/synths and memorable vocals underpin what is a remarkably catchy track. The Chorus is a real ‘ear worm’-I find myself humming it to myself all the time.

The mix of Keys/Synths and Solid Guitars could be used to describe a lot of the album. Other top tracks for my taste include "Call of the Wild", "Crysteria", "Sole Conviction" & the closing ballad "Till you Meet Again".

The album’s title Crysteria may or may not be an intended play on words between the band’s name (Crystal Ball) and the title of Def Leppard’s classic album Hysteria. If this wasn’t the intention, it’s a happy coincidence because any comparisons to Def Leppard aren’t too far off the mark.

The band have a new Guitarist, Peter Berger, who contributed many songs and ideas to this album and is cited as a refreshing and motivating input. I also understand that they had ~30 tracks written over the pandemic-related-touring-hiatus which allowed them to ensure that the material that made it onto the album was solid from top to bottom- 11 tracks and 2 bonus tracks made it onto the album.

I must admit that 13 tracks of this style is a bit of a slog for me to listen to from top to tail but I’m sure that die-hard fans of this sort of style will get through without any trouble at all.

Despite my lack of history with the band and their past material, and the fact that this style isn’t my usual ‘go to’ I enjoy enough of this album enough to recommend it to fans of 80s hard rock / heavy metal, especially those who have a penchant for a big sing along chorus!

Track List
01. What Part Of No
02. You Lit My Fire
03. Call Of The Wild (Feat. Ronnie Romero)
04. I Am Rock
05. Undying
06. Crysteria
07. Make My Day
08. No Limits
09. Draw The Line
10. Loins On Fire
11. Sole Conviction
12. Crystal Heart (Feat. Jaded Heart) (Bonus Track)
13. Till You Meet Again (Bonus Track)

Added: January 17th 2022
Reviewer: Chris Reid
Score:
Related Link: Band Website
Hits: 1215
Language: english

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