The Magnificent - The Magnificent

The Magnificent is a musical project, a collaboration; most rightfully, between the Finnish producer/guitarist Torsti Spoof (Leverage) and the singer Michael Eriksen (Circus Maximus) from Norway. Thus, those two guys decided to form this project in order to play melodic rock music with many hard rock elements. The guys that consist the rest of the band are: Rolf Pilve on drums, Sami Norbacka on bass and Jukka Karinen on keyboards.

 

So, why two guys that are playing a completely different kind of music with their official bands, decided to record a melodic rock album? I really cannot answer this one… I can only assume that, because they are talented indeed, they were asked to complete this project. After all, Pekka Heino (Brother Firetribe, Leverage), Tomppa Nikulainen (Brother Firetribe), Tuomas Heikkinen (Leverage). Mats Haugen (Circus Maximus), Kimmo Blom (Urban Tale) and others have contributed in the songwriting. You do not need more, in order to see that the songs were almost ready and two known and talented musicians were needed to make this happen. Frontiers always have ideas like this and offer new, fresh melodic rock albums that well-known composers and musicians are participating.

 

As I said before, the music in the album is melodic rock with hard rock elements… it has an 80s felling but with a fresh sound… and if you take a look at the bands above (Torsti and his buddies are responsible for all the songs), then you will totally understand what you are going to listen to here. It’s like a softer side of Leverage; it has the melodic elements of Brother Firetribe along with lots of Europe and Whitesnake influences. It is well produced, well arranged and well played in any way.

 

Rockers like: “Cheated By Love”, “Satin & Lace”, “Bullets”, “Smoke & Fire”, “Tired Of Dreaming” (my personal favorite), “Lost” and ballads such as: “Angel”, “If It Takes All Night”, “Harvest Moon” (Whitesnake’s spirit is all over this one)will please all the melodic rock/hard rock fans out there. This is an utterly good melodic rock album that contains some very good songs. It’s not a masterpiece that you can’t live without and it won’t make you love this kind of music if you haven’t till now… it will offer you some fine melodic tunes though.