Alter Bridge
One Day Remains

THE REVIEW

And here we go again.

A welcome back (or a welcome, depending), to the DeBaser users who will read this, my fourth review. After "System Of A Down," "Tool," and "Lacuna Coil," I've decided to review the only album by a band that's not very famous in Italy; maybe you knew them by another name. Anyway, these guys are four (specifically, Scott Phillips on drums, Brian Marshall on bass, Mark Tremonti, vocals + guitar and leader, and Myles Kennedy vocals) and they gather under a curious name: Alter Bridge.

From the little I know, and it's really little, the current Alter Bridge is nothing more than a band born from the ashes of the "Creed," of which Phillips, Marshall, and Tremonti were indeed part. In short, these are Creed with a different voice. Period.

The group's name is curious: it is said that, when Tremonti was a kid, there was a bridge in his village that he and his friends called "Alter Bridge" because they thought it was a meeting point between Earth and the Hereafter. Well, it wouldn’t be a bad idea, although I wouldn't want to see the spirits of deceased people fluttering around the village square, but we're digressing. Let's go back to the album in question and try to analyze it point by point. First of all, the cover. It's beautiful, very poetic, depicting once again this blessed bridge, but the effect is as suggestive as ever, as it is represented from an unusual point of view, namely from the river, under a kind of gallery. The sky is interesting: in the foreground, it's beautiful blue covered with small clouds, in the background reddish with black hues. Then the lyrics booklet. Here there's a negative note, as all the songs are transcribed in an ancient way that makes them almost unreadable unless one places oneself three centimeters from the page with a magnifying glass.

Finally, the CD. A premise: it's absolutely nothing new. These are songs with rhythmic and melodic patterns used many times (and even surpassed). But I quite liked this album. Anyway, now let's get into the details. There are 11 tracks, all of a hard rock nature with slight metal and (oh God! Don’t shoot me) grunge influences. The album opens with "Find The Real" which has a decidedly dark start with a sharp and violent guitar riff, the verses are excellently sung by Kennedy who, as far as vocal skills are concerned, is no novice, but the chorus, in my opinion, is a bit subpar, as it's on the verge of pop (listen to it and you'll tell me). Despite this, the song regains strength in the subsequent verses, and the end is really nice, with Kennedy letting out a scream for a good fifteen seconds, then followed by a drum roll. The second song is self-titled and has a slight electronic flavor, although it's still Tremonti dominating with his electric guitar. Once again, the chorus loses intensity compared to the verses, and halfway through the song, there's a vocal virtuosity by Kennedy that didn't convince me. The third composition is called "Open Your Eyes", it was chosen as the band's third single, and I must say that it's fundamentally the right choice, as the song's alleged initial roughness (which opens with a fake hard rock melody) fades more and more over the seconds until it resumes at the chorus and then calms down again. An excellent performance by Marshall here who, amidst the halfway song frenzy, explodes into a wonderful solo. The fourth track, titled "Burn It Down", starts with a very calm solo guitar, and all in all, it's not a wild song, but it's really too long, and it loses its way. The fifth song "Metalingus" is perhaps the wildest of the entire album: preceded by a drum roll, it's very hard rock throughout its duration, the chorus is delightful (even though the song is practically composed solely of it), and the finale is definitely explosive, with Kennedy rising in all his vocal power while behind him, Phillips and Tremonti explode furiously into a devastating riff. A curiosity: it's the entrance music of the current WWE champion Edge since 2005. Of a completely different nature - and this is a song that left me decidedly surprised - is the sixth track, "Broken Wings", a blues from start to finish (especially the start) that turns into a rocking song after forty seconds and shifts into a determined hard rock in the chorus, only to revert to the initial blues. A track that requires four or five listens to fully understand but is absolutely worth it. Song number 7, "In Loving Memory", one of the album's flaws, as it's dedicated to Kennedy's mother and surely nauseatingly sappy, not even the roaring guitars give the rock effect needed to properly lift the song up. All in all, the eighth composition "Down To My Last" is pleasant, hard rock just right, without many frills, with the guitar riffs and vocal parts in their place, without flaws, and it's perhaps this absurd perfection that makes the text a bit lifeless. But the path changes decisively - and I stress decisively - with the ninth song, titled "Watch Your Words". The start is menacing, with an echo of a melody that sinisterly resonates, and shortly afterward the song explodes in a terrifying way, with Tremonti’s riffs sounding very harsh and seemingly crafted to shake the hair to the rhythm of the music. The verses are well constructed: after a brief vocalization by Myles Kennedy, here's Tremonti and Marshall resuming the opening "melody," but then the song takes a significant stylistic drop, transforming from metal to soft rock, with yet another similar-pop chorus and more determined verses, with a newly metal attitude.

Another flaw with song number 10, "Shed My Skin", which doesn't have a precise rhythm and this time it goes randomly and not even the four Americans seem to be as strong as before, but let themselves be guided by a possible cue and implant a song that doesn't hold up. Finally, the closure, in my opinion worthy, of a good album: "The End Is Here", still raw hard rock with these young people proving to be a good promise for the future. They are not certainly exceptional, and they definitely need to improve the choruses, but as they are, they can be a good listen to chase away stress and clear the mind.

P.S. One last note: the average length of the songs is five minutes, and all in all, the 15 euros for the album are more than acceptably spent. Now let's hear your comments. Peace.