Review Summary: Fantastic Power Metal Album.
5 years after Southgate, Seventh Avenue returned with Between The Worlds, and it does not disappoint. Its an improvement over Southgate in almost every conceivable way, which is saying a lot. The only way it did not improve was in the acoustic sections, which were actually better in Southgate, but considering just how good Between The Worlds is, this really doesn't damper the affect of the album. The Twin Leads and solos are flawless and they flow amazingly with the other parts of the songs. You can really tell these boys from Germany put there whole heart and soul into this one.
The intro "Beyond The Ocean" is much easier to take seriously than the previous album's "Introduce". Its comprised of creative acoustic and electric instrumentals and makes you think of some kind of ancient Irish war hymn played long ago. This description oozes cheesiness, but its effect is exactly that, and it works well with the title track to follow.
The title track is a textbook example of how to start an album. Hitting hard and fast, "A Step Between The Worlds" rips out riffs that are a shredders paradise and are truly inspiring.
"Levy Your Soul From Hate" dabbles with a thrash/mosh style chorus which is a very nice change of pace, then "Tale Of The Forgotten Dreams" opening leads/riffs sounds rather random, but after a couple minutes it comes full circle and it becomes apparent that all that randomness starts to make sense, and that those first two minutes are just the build up to the swirling vortex of powerful twin leads. Then the song falls back into the sea of riffs until it builds once again to a fast picking paw mute that starts an excellent solo.
"Angel's Eyes" is the most well constructed and balanced song in the album, and would probably be the editor's choice. "Open Your Mind" is the best track off the record, and it basically harnesses all the best elements of the album and rolls them all into one. It opens well with a confident twin lead, gets into the riffing and then after a couple of minutes goes into another twin lead tornado, much like in "Tale Of The Forgotten Dreams", but this time its shorter, faster, and it paces better with the song, although its not quite as powerful in comparison. Then after some more riffing a well placed mid-paced solo emerges, which slows down for an acoustic section that acts as a perfect build up to the high rising chorus, that leads into the second solo, which is the best solo on the album. This song has a lot of pieces and even though its definitely not the longest track, Seventh Avenue somehow manages to compact all this into six and a half minutes.
"Storm 2" continues the strain of songs titled storm, with more emphasis on the riffing department than its predecessor "Storm 1", and it delivers satisfactory classic metal inspired riffs. "Until You Come Again" opens with an acoustic that is most likely inspired by Pink Floyd, but then changes into something altogether different, with more catchy, classic metal style riffing (Until You Come Again is stronger than Storm 2 in this respect). The song then winds its way through a low key intro which goes into the most energetic classic metal style solo on the record.
"Wings Of Dawn" starts with an energetic base line, and it must be said that Seventh Avenue doesn't feature base oriented sections in there songs much, but when they do, they are very good. The Song goes straight through some rousing choruses, and the solo is good but doesn't seem to be as elaborate, or well thought out as the solos on the rest of the album. The only other point of contention besides the acoustic quality is the fact that there aren't as many slow paced songs in Between The Worlds as there were in Southgate. In fact there is only one, which is "Touch Of Your Love" and despite this fact, Seventh Avenue pulls this one off beautifully and it has the most heartfelt and compelling lyrics in the album.
The excellent cover of the Survivor song "Burning Heart" is supped up with double bass, and Seventh Avenue's own flavor of twin leads. After all this quality song writing, it may seem that the nine minute "One Life Ends" is just a lengthy filler track just begging to be skipped, but just hold your horses here. Seventh Avenue really pulls a rabbit out of a hat here, and manages to comprise the song of an appropriately orchestrated guitar intro, that really gives gravity to the title of the track, and original riffing and a unique Eddie Van Halen style solo to top it all off. A spectacular effort, start to finish by Seventh Avenue.
