Stamina
System of Power

Some things were immediately obvious once I heard Stamina for the first time, it was obvious that they are an Italian band and that they have listened a lot to a band called Royal Hunt. I find it very Italian to call a progressive rock/metal band Stamina, this is their fourth album and on the cover it looks quite good – it also sounds rather good.

I mentioned Royal Hunt in the prior paragraph and it is difficult to get through writing this review without mentioning said band. If you know them you can make a fair assessment on how it sounds as it sounds very similar to them. It is a well-produced album, the sound is strong and the album’s eight track show a decent variation over a 46-minute playing time. The band is clearly competent and knows how to put together a well-sounding album, albeit the singer could be somewhat better but that is not a big issue. Fans of said band and other bands of similar disposition will like this album and it will certainly give them a familiar sensation, as it can’t be said to be an album that offers anything we haven’t heard before.

It may not be a fresh thinking album that gives me as a listener a sensation of novelty, but it is a good album with strong songs and likeable sound. I believe it will go down well in the groups they aim to sell their album to, I like it. The thing is though that this isn’t really a particularly memorable album, sure the fifth track is rather great and the third track One in a Million that to me feels like something extremely borrowed from Royal Hunt is another great track, but this album will not be mentioned years from now – like so many others it will only be some letters in a long list of albums released in 2017.

In the end I think this will be an album that will appeal to fans of Royal Hunt, Yngwie Malmsteen’s Rising Force and their peers. I think that it is good but it lacks novelty and that is a hurdle that the album just isn’t good enough to overcome and as I stated before: it is a good album to listen to but one that you will soon forget.

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