Band:	Firewind
Album:	Firewind
Style:	Heavy metal, Power metal
Release date:	May 2020

01. Welcome To The Empire
02. Devour
03. Rising Fire
04. Break Away
05. Orbitual Sunrise
06. Longing To Know You
07. Perfect Stranger
08. Overdrive
09. All My Life
10. Space Cowboy
11. Kill The Pain

What is it with bands these days and releasing self-titled albums years into their careers? Anyway, so the new Firewind album is called Firewind. Does this album rekindle the fire that I've been missing in the last couple of Firewind releases? Ehm, no, not really to be honest.

It started pretty well when I heard the first track of the album "Welcome To The Empire". The song has nice melodies, some nice guitar shredding and a raw punchy feel to the riffs. Vintage Firewind. It could have easily featured on The Premonition. The next song as well. For all the wrong reasons though. It sounds like they recycled riffs from "Into The Fire". Is it bad? No. Does it sound uninspired? Yes.

And that's unfortunately also how I feel about the rest of the album. This all sounds like stuff you've heard from Firewind before. And in many cases also from other power metal bands.

What about the production? It's good. Clean and polished like the last couple of releases. Every instrument as well as the vocals gets the attention it deserves. I miss the raw energy from their debut though. They never seemed to be able to recapture that magic (in terms of production). It was unique and powerful and made me instantly fall in love with the band. This production however isn't very unique and feels pretty run of the mill.

Onwards to the performance then. And that's also good. Guitars, drums, bass and vocals, all of it sounds very solid. These guys have some serious skill and they keep proving that with every album they put out.

Lyrics wise, you can expect the standard power metal type lyrics. It's ok. Not extremely evocative, nor painfully cheesy.

Yeah, I don't really have much to say about this record if I'm honest. It felt average throughout. And these are the kind of records that disappoint me, so I want to write about why that is. But when the time eventually comes to write it, you realise that there isn't that much to talk about. And that's been the case with their last couple of releases. Immortals wasn't incredibly spectacular either in my opinion. But that one had more memorable moments in it.

Let me be clear. This is not a bad album. But it isn't very exciting either. Firewind can do much better. Hell, their debut is still in my top 10 favourite power metal albums. So, I expect more from them.

If you like the typical power metal tropes and just want another album to listen through, then this one is ok for that. If, however, you're looking for a truly unique sounding album, then this is not going to be something for you. The fire is still burning with this one, just a little less bright.