Time Signature
Stand up...
Genre: hard rock
Hailing from Norway, the land of black metal, hard rockers The Wheel reminds us that the Norwegian rock scene actually has a lot of other things to offer than just black metal.
Drawing on both AOR, traditional metal, and hard rock, The Wheel's debut album combines melody with heaviness and locks and loads with a mag full of strong riffs and rock 'n' roll spirit - I mean just check a 70s-like groovy track like 'Love' and compare it to the 80s-styled melodic metal track that follows it 'Tellin' No Lies', which are quite different from one another but equally catchy, while 'Sparks' is a power ballad with a hint of country-western twang. A tune like 'Lost Souls' blends heavy blues-based southern rock and heavy metal, while 'Comin' On' combines funk rock with Thin Lizzy-esque guitar harmonies... and guess what, it bleedin' works! To make a long story short, who says that hard rock needs to be boring and one-dimensional? Well, whoever says that has not heard The Wheel's debut album, because it is characterized by variation and the Norwegians make sure that the listener is never bored.
The production is crisp and well-defined and the guitars have been given a quite heavy sound, which I appreciate, and the musicianship is high; the vocals have a bluesy and soulful quality to them which suits the overall atmosphere of the tunes on the album very well.
Recommended to fans of melodic hard rock who do not mind a metallic edge and references to proto-metal and heavy blues rock, "The Wheel" is a tasteful and catchy hard rock release.