EuroVision - On Fire
Who's To Blame
Without You (I Just Don't Belong)
Lost
Pretending
I'm On Fire
On The Inside
Last Night
Bed Of Roses
Please
You're So Fine
This is the debut album for EuroVision, released after several months of aggressive Internet promotion and persistence yielded a label deal with Leg End Productions. Eurovision is based out of Georgia, and is comprised of songwriter/programmer/drummer Joe Ramey (the main online presence of the band) and Mike Allred, the vocalist who also aides in programming and songwriting. The album features the two singles "Without You" and "Lost", and 8 other original songs. No added remixes or bonus tracks, which seems to me a bit of a old-school approach, as many new bands nowadays seem to add remixes to their album merely to add perceived value to the album. That's not always true, though. It's kinda refreshing to see EuroVision let the songs stand on their own here on the album, without added remixes or alternate takes or a cover of a well-known classic song to overshadow the original songs themselves.
I think I've mentioned it before, in my review of the band's demo, but their recording sounds like it was recorded with analog equipment, at least to my ears. The sound quality isn't all that sharp, and from what I've been able to learn, the label handled all the mastering of the album. I'm not sure (if I was in the band) I'd let them do that again, as I think possibly a outside mastering job could have helped out the sound quality issues here.
All that aside, this is a very solid album, considering. "Lost" and "Without You" were excellent choices for singles, as they really show the band at it's best, song-wise. The guitar parts in "I'm On Fire" and "On The Inside" are muted, but still very much a part of the songs, and I actually really like it. It makes the songs stand out somewhat from the others, with out feeling like the band is "rocking out". Some other songs that really leapt out and grabbed me were "Last Night" and "Please". There are times in this album, I'm reminded a little bit of one of A Different Drum's first releases, the Paradigm album. There's just a little bit of a similar feel here. Nothing definite, but somewhat reminiscent of that band. Anyway, this is a quality debut release for EuroVision. Not perfect, but good, and the band shows a whole lot of promise. It should be exciting to see where the band goes from here.
Added: Tuesday, July 20, 2004
Reviewer: Jason Baker
Score:
Related web link: Official Website
hits: 475
Language: eng
EuroVision "On Fire" $ 6 -- Here is a low-priced debut album by another new
American synthpop act called EuroVision that plays a pleasant, melodic
sound reminiscent of classic 80's synth/new wave bands, with really nice
vocals. They have some romantic, ballad-style songs that stand out, like
"Without You (I Just Don't Belong)" or "Lost".
This was an excerpt from Todd Durant of A Different Drum in one of his New Release Email updates.
This was EuroVision's 2004 released CD and their 1st CD release and my first CD release of any of my solo adventures throughout the years. I've done some cassette demos with artwork releases on some other things, and as a drummer, I had some cassette and CD releases with other bands, but with any of my own original songs, this was my 1st true release and I was very excited and pleased with this release. This was also a CD basically 8 years in the making, although Michael Allred only joined up as vocalist in 2002.
We both split songwriting on this release, Mike did 6 of the 10 songs musically and I did the other 4, but I did most of the lyrics for "You're So Fine".
This CD was reviewed by Jason Baker of Synthpop.net and he gave it 4 of 5 stars, but its just a beginning for EV, as their 2nd CD release "Finale" is even better. But thats my opinion as this blog states in the beginning.
Artwork was done by Hiroshi Rodriguez, an artist I found out about while vacationing one year in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, USA with my family. I bought 3 pieces of art from him, one is for the album "Finale", one for "On Fire" and another one still hasnt been used, YET. :-)
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