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(reviewed by Nick Karn)
Yngwie Malmsteen's debut with his backing band Rising Force (hence the album title), is a very innovative 80s guitar album in combining the techniques of Eddie Van Halen and Randy Rhoads and taking a neoclassical approach to unprecedented technical heights. Unfortunately, Yngwie wouldn't really stray from this path on subsequent albums, but this was the starting point before his act got more stale and boring. Rising Force contains more in the way of instrumental cuts than future albums, thankfully only featuring two cuts with vocalist Jeff Scott Soto, who apparently thinks he's some badass power metal singer, but he comes off as laughable, especially on the otherwise decent "Now Your Ships Are Burned" (which contains a good lengthy jam), although his style does make the soaring chorus of "As Above, So Below" work well.
The rest of the album contains probably some of Yngwie's more inventive and listenable soloing, although throughout, the opening "Black Star" is really the only composition that's completely captivating the whole way through, as his soloing over a dramatic Jens Johansson keyboard line is absolutely breathtaking. The keyboards and guitar merge exceptionally well together in the middle section of "Far Beyond The Sun", which otherwise seem standard. The more classically influenced "Icarus' Dream Suite" is a little too overlong at 8-1/2 minutes, but it does contain some beautiful melodic playing. "Farewell" is a good reprise of the acoustic intro to "Black Star", while "Evil Eye" and "Little Savage" have their moments too, but most of the compositions just can't stay focused due to Yngwie's ego-driven wanking and the occasional crappy vocals. Still enough fabulous moments to recommend it, though.
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COMMENTS
This album is pretty good as I recall; I have not heard it for awhile, but back when I played the drums I hung around some guitar nazis who listened to this disc all the time. It can sure get boring in places, and it doesn't have many singable melodies to speak of (at least for a classic pop junkie like myself), but some of the intricate playing and complex compositions are really engaging. And "As Above, So Below" is an extremely catchy old metal song, no matter how bad the lyrics are. The follow-up to this album, Marching Out, was better in terms of pop-craft and assessable hard rock, but like the aforementioned song, a lot of it is really corny, there's Scott's mediocre power metal posing to spare, and the result altogether has not aged well. It's still a decent record too, though, and that "I Feel the Light Tonight" (or whatever) song is pretty awesome. So is "I Am a Viking." I suppose both Yngwie albums are technical guitar-metal classics and could be rewarded 7s, although I would have to listen to them again to offer a more confident assessment. It's too bad that Yngwie's masturbatory guitar pretensions made everything after his first two outings practically unlistenable. But if you want to check out more good, '80s style technical metal, try to hunt down the first two (possibly only) Racer X albums; more stupidly entertaining cheese metal with impressive playing.
In response to the post about Rising Force by Yngwie, that album is basically the cornerstone of every neoclassical album released since the 80s...also, it doesn't reflect Eddie Van Halen or Randy Rhoads whatsoever. The reviewer, I believe, is...ham fisted at best. Randy Rhoads was a master at melodic composing and tapping...Rhoads could compare to Eddie's style, but neither of them ever used sweep picking, which is the basis of anything Yngwie ever wrote. And the vocals really weren't bad on that album. I would give the album a 9/10. Hrm...I should assassinate whoever made that post and ride their carcass to salvation.
It' s great. The world had never seen such guitar playing before. There were many guitarists (R. Blackmore, Uli Roth, R. Rhoads) who tried to approach classical music and hard rock but it was in fact Yngwie who created a new musical genre.
(reviewed by Pat D.)
I cannot BELIEVE I bought this album. Surfing around the net to various music and guitar websites, I often meet strange characters. Most of them are fanatical devotees of the man who made this disc, Mr. Yngwie J. Malmsteen. So, tiring of their constant Yngwie praising and ass-kissing, I ventured into one of their Yngwie-fan pages with Real Audio files. I downloaded a clip of "The Seventh Sign" off of Yngwie's release of the same name. Lo and behold, I loved it. It was one of those quirky, yet catchy 80's metal songs that grows on you. Well, it grew on ME, OK?
I wanted a better copy of that song, cause Real Audio blows and I have yet to find a single Yngwie mp3 on the net. However, allmusic informed me that that album was no longer in print. Seeing that the great Yngwie had a greatest hits collection out, I figured hey, if this album was too good to include "The Seventh Sign", I'm gonna love it.
Oooooh, I have never been SO wrong. This album (and apparently Yngwie in general) is SO bad, it makes Talk Show look like a musical and lyrical masterpiece. Hell, I'd even go as far to say that I like U2's horrendous Zooropa more than this. So why the higher rating? Well, Yngwie can SHRED. About the only redeeming quality here are the impossibly fast lead breaks by Mr. Malmsteen. But they are not even CLOSE to making this album enjoyable. They might interest you if you are an aspiring guitar shredder, but if I were learning the guitar, I wouldn't want to copy music that I found laughable. Especially when there are plenty of other guitarists out there that are just as good as Yngwie. In fact, rumor has it that some dude named Joe Stump is considered the fastest guitarist in the world, effectively neutralizing anything Yngwie brings to the table.
The biggest problem I have with most of this album is the vocalists. I believe Yngwie snipped the nut sack of every vocalist he had before they entered the studio. It is REALLY that bad. Add that to the fact the every damn song sounds like really BAD 80's hair metal. Some songs on here are so ridiculously over-the-top its laughable. The only song I could remotely stand is "Black Star", cause it has no vocals! If you have $18 to burn, and you'd like a good laugh, buy this album and listen to "Liar". I honestly do not know whether to laugh that something so ridiculous ever made it to market, laugh that some people actually think this is great music, or cry that I got suckered into buying this shit.
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(reviewed by Pat D.)
I'll tell you all one thing. Finding an album out of print is a bitch. And man, did I want this album. For those of you who did not read my unceremonious crushing of Mr. Malmsteen above, I have been looking for the title track on this album EVERYWHERE. But alas, most mp3 sites on the good ol' Internet have nothing but Korn and Limp Bizkit shit. None of which are worth a single byte on their respective servers.
Dammit, why can't people put GOOD music, or even HARD TO FIND music on their mp3 servers? You can find 5 BILLION copies of some mediocre crap pop song like the Barenaked Ladies' "One Week", or one of the many completely interchangable Goo Goo Dolls songs, but ask the mp3 search engine for some truly GREAT songs, and you get a stupid "Sorry, that file was not found" answer.
What was I reviewing again? Oh yeah. Now, let me just state that my opinion of the above Yngwie Malmsteen Collection has not changed one bit. It is still one of the most laughably dated and bad albums I own. However, this effort is not quite as bad. Which is kind of funny. I mean, a greatest hits album getting trounced by a not-in-print studio release? Strange. The main `reason, I guess, for this album being better than other Yngwie I have had the unfortunate experience of hearing, is that it was released in the mid-90's, so Malmsteen has made his music decidedly heavier and less over the top. So the band sounds less like some bad 80's hair metal group, and more like 80's light thrash.
Notice I said "less". There are still a couple of tracks on here that are that same overblown shit that saturated Malmsteen's HORRIFIC greatest hits compilation. On the other hand, Yngwie actually does some kind of pseudo-blues guitar on one track! Amazing. In closing, I'd like to say "The Seventh Sign" is an incredible song. And the rest of the album is pretty tolerable. Not great, but its great for Yngwie.
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