Gotthard - Firebirth

Gotthard
Firebirth
Nuclear Blast
2012
6
This one is hard to review. Gotthard are trying to find their identity after the tragic loss of their mastermind/vocalist Steve Lee. It’s true that the band had become truly popular over the last decade when, according to me, they delivered not only some excellent hard rock albums (“Lipservice” & “Domino Effect”)… but also the best of their entire career. So, how hard is it to go on without Steve these days? How emotionally overloaded was the atmosphere while recording and playing in the studio?
 
Nic Maeder is the guy that was chosen to replace Steve. He has a warm & raspy voice… close to Steve’s by then again quite different. His singing exhales an ala Steve feeling though.
 
Overall, the album has some OK hard rockers (but more mediocre ones) and three emotional ballads, “Remember it’s Me”, “Tell Me” & “Where Are You”. The sound is big and the band is moving on the usual known places it did with the last previous works. This time the songs are not as memorable and catchy as in the past, though. I believe this is among the average works of the band along with “Homerun” & “Open”. Probably, it will be fine for the die-hard fans of the band… but there isn’t much to find here. Let’s hope the follow-up release will get them back in the game again…