Wicked Sensation – Crystallized

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Their first album in six years, and only their third overall since 2001, Crystallized is probable Wicked Sensation’s finest moment to date, giving highly respected vocalist Robert Soeterboek, who left after the first album, plenty to work with and several styles to try his hand at. The beauty of Crystallized is in that variety. The presence of Helloween‘s Andi Deris gives My Turn To Fly gives it a soft-power-metal feel, album highlight Give It Up grooves like something off the Chickenfoot album, Soeterboek pulling out a superb Hagar impression, and other tracks cover everything from melodic hard rock a la Whitesnake (Lost In A World, Am I Right), metal riffs (Ordinary Man, the Miracle Man-esque Running Through Your Veins), to an acoustic ballad in The Love I Used To Know. The album brings together tracks of all speeds and degrees of heaviness right through to grand closer Bleeding Hearts which spends its verses firmly in Coverdale territory and its choruses in a more AOR vein. Crystallized touches all the bases and with the help of yet another expert production job from tireless bassist Dennis Ward it does it well. Very well.

Written by Andy Lye
More: 2010, Albums, Hard Rock, Quick.Play Reviews, Wicked Sensation