Yngwie Johann Malmsteen
Rising Force

We are back in 1984, and a new star is already shining in the firmament of the six strings, a young Scandinavian musician who, for better or worse, would profoundly and incisively change the way of understanding the electric guitar: Yngwie Johann Malmsteen.

At that time, there was certainly no shortage of so-called "guitar heroes," just remember masters like Ritchie Blackmore, Uli Jon Roth, Eddie Van Halen, or Michael Schenker, and the list could go on. Yet, the Swede soon managed to stand out: an enormous ego, combined with extraordinary talent and lightning-fast speed, are undoubtedly the first key to understanding, but "Rising Force" proves to go well beyond that; contrary to what many staunch critics think, the musical content of this album prevails over any other aspect, including technique, which although it is at the absolute peak in the neoclassical field, is always subordinate to the pursuit of sophisticated, learned compositions, never verbose or baroque. The same infamous speed, so hated by those who have always tried to discredit Malmsteen, is here expertly calibrated and alternated with phrases where melody and the desire to move the listener find ample and noble representation.
Thus emerge tracks of great depth and intensity like “Black Star,” “Evil Eye,” “Icarus Dream Suite,” “Little Savage” which, if one wishes to be at least slightly objective, cannot be basely categorized in the very approximate and superficial realm of mere virtuosic and speedy display, because the latter represents only part of a whole, just a link in a much wider and more complex mechanism where a love for classical music, pathos, and rare beauty alchemies blend admirably with exquisite technique, giving rise to an inseparable and indispensable unicum.

If we also add the sound factor, which in Rising Force reaches levels of extremely high quality, especially in terms of clarity and incisiveness, I firmly believe that this work represents a milestone in the genre and also an absolute zenith for Yngwie himself, who was unable, in the following years, to find such a high creative vein, increasingly resting on the laurels of a glorious and possibly too great past.