Band:	Freedom Call
Album:	The Circle Of Life
Style:	Power metal
Release date:	March 21, 2005
A review by:	Malcolm

01. Mother Earth
02. Carry On
03. Rhythm Of Life
04. Hunting High And Low
05. Starlight
06. The Gathering (Midtro)
07. Kings & Queens
08. Hero Nation
09. High Enough
10. Starchild
11. The Eternal Flame
12. The Circle Of Life

One of the leading Happy Metal bands, Freedom Call, is about to release their fourth full-length album, and I can imagine that the pressure was more tangible now than ever since their latest album ("Eternity" from 2002) became such success around the world, and made Freedom Call one of the most famous and recognizable bands around.

So now, after three years, is the time, Freedom Call has completed their new album and it's ready to be released. And for all of you that's waiting for "Eternity part.2" can just forget it, "The Circle of Life" is different, much different from the sound Freedom Call once had, actually this new album is a big step away (and forwards) from almost everything Freedom Call made their name out of.

Now, that's not always a bad thing, and to be completely honest with you, Freedom Call is recognizable, you can easily hear that it's Freedom Call you're listening too, but the music is very different. First of all, the addition of Nils Neumann on keyboards has a part in all this, now the music is very much keyboard-influenced, but not always in the usual way, the keyboards here are sometimes strange, it's more Synth-keyboards than Metal in some songs.
Then the guitar-work is different too, it's way more heavy and rough now.
And also the lyrics, the Taragon-theme is gone, and the lyrics now are more about our world, politics and stuff.

Another thing is that the songs doesn't have much of this oozing Happy themes anymore, some of these new songs sounds a bit sad and dark (if you compare with the older FC songs), and they don't have this over-catchy feeling either, they seems more mature, the whole concept seems to be changing, and not just the lyrics and the catchiness.
But as I said, it's not only too the bad, personally I feel that this album was needed to keep Freedom Call interesting, they were about to drown in all the clones there are today.

But do not fear, you'll get a little of the old Freedom Call as well, songs like "Carry on" "Starchild", "Starlight" and parts of "Hunting High and Low" reminds me much of the earlier works.
But on the other side, songs like the dark "Hero Nation" and "Kings & Queens" sounds like nothing else, it's not like Freedom Call but it's damn good.

One more thing, don't let yourself get fooled and think that this is some kind of tribute album or something, just because of the song names "Mother Earth (Like the one with Within Temptation), "Hunting High and Low (Stratovarius), "Starlight" (Helloween), "Hero Nation" (Metalium) to name a few, they aren't covers, they are Freedom Call songs that just got the same name as the more famous ones.
I was fooled, I thought it was too much of a coincident that there were so many songs with the same name, but I was wrong, they were NOT covers, they are new songs by Freedom Call.
I just felt that I should point that out, so no one should get fooled.

Personally I'm holding this album really high, and after listening to if for some days now I'm almost ready to confess that this is the best I ever heard with Freedom Call, but I'll save that to later, just in case.
Don't get me wrong, I like their old albums as well, I can't point out one single bad song, but I think this was needed. This was something Freedom Call had to do too stay on the top, and I bow for them for dare to change this much.

Go and buy your own copy on the 21st of March, you can't be without this album if you're really a fan. Even if there are changing, they are still Freedom Call, the Freedom Call we all love.

"The Rhythm of Life,
The River of Life, the one that keeps us all alive"

Check Out: "Starlight", "Kings & Queens" & "Hero Nation".