Not a year goes by without a visit from Magnus Karlsson. Well, almost, because since 2001 only 2004 has not had the honour of the guitarist's presence on a record. That's something to respect. His Free Fall project has just given birth to a fourth offspring called "Hunt The Flame". It's quite a challenge for him, as his first album "We Are The Night" received a lot of praise.
Magnus Karlsson called upon eleven frontmen to interpret as many titles. Most of them obviously come from the Frontiers label since we're in the melodic hard rock/metal den. They are often from the new wave such as Alexander Strandell (Crowne), James Durbin (Durbin), Kristian Fyhr (Seventh Crystal), James Robledo (Demons Down) and Terje Haroy (Pyramaze).
Each of them brings a vocal colour to the composition they have been given. This tinge is the only one that differentiates the songs from each other. "Hunt The Flame" is indeed linear to say the least. Made of constant epic and grandiloquent bursts, of omnipresent theatrical and energetic symphonic ambiences, of incessant drumming and guitars filling the sound space, the listening turns out to be a bit boring at the end.
Nevertheless, listening to the opus reserves some pleasures, notably on a few tracks magnified by their performers. Among them, the eponymous track where the damn talented Alexander Strandell makes us want to go through Crowne's entire discography again, and 'Far From Home' with the no less impressive James Robledo. Let's keep 'Following The Damned', which Raphael Mendes transforms into a composition that could come out of a Bruce Dickinson album, and 'Summoning The Stars' for its changes of rhythm and its variety.
"Hunt The Flame" will certainly please the fans of Magnus Karlsson but it will probably not interest the rest of the melodic metal world. With all due respect, we would advise Magnus to take a little more time to compose his works...