Vintage Queensryche and Iron Maiden collide with classic Dokken and Scorpions (plus present-day Edguy and Blind Guardian) on The Vision, an American-made metal album that will blow you away. While many bands with veteran musicians – Wycked Synn's guitarist and founder Ken Orth has been prowling the circuit for almost 20 years – are content simply to record new music by relying on old formulas that they perfected back in the day, these guys manage to take the best of what made U.S.-bred metal great in the Eighties and meld those influences with Europe's current power-metal sound. The result? Full-speed-ahead anthems such as "If You Said Goodbye," "In My Mind" and "Tell the Tale," which sidle up next to power-metal rockers like the title track and "The Savior." Meanwhile, the Ozzy/Lita-sounding ballad "Let It Rain" — featuring a stunning performance by Kimberly Ledesma in a duet with Wycked Synn vocalist Gary Grant — would have been one of the Eighties' biggest-chorus ballads 15 years ago.
Speaking of Grant, the man injects The Vision with much of its potency by invoking Ronnie James Dio and Blind Guardian's Hansi Kürsch, and Orth's playing recalls George Lynch. The instrumental "K.M.A." singes your ears, but filler like the generic "Til the End" and "Unchosen Path" bring down the overall caliber of The Vision — only a notch, though.
Just because Wycked Synn would have been huge in the Eighties doesn't mean the band can't generate some excitement now. Granted, the audience may be smaller, but the sound is as mammoth as melodic metal gets these days.
Printer Friendly Page
Send to a Friend
