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Anyone kicking off a rock album with a power ballad is someone confident in their sonic skin. Most people would come charging out of the blocks with a few sucker punch moves, a salvo of the more attention-grabbing and noticeable songs (not that this isn’t attention grabbing and noticeable, but you know what I mean) first before they settle down into a power ballad like “I Believe.” But Atom Stone is not most people, and Take Me To The Fire is not your standard debut album.
The title track comes next, a big, polished, and anthemic slice of classic rock. However, this is not the final word in Stone’s sound either. The reality is that it is between these two ends of the spectrum, the balanced and balladic and the kick-ass and energetic, that the real artist emerges.
“Watch Me Die” shows that he makes music just as big, just as clever, and just as impressive when working in more pop territories, “Hell on Wheels” sees him in incendiary, ballsy, blues-rock realms, and if “Battlefield” edges in to, if not quite country pastures, it is undoubtedly on nodding terms with the whole Americana and alt-country scene.
But what I appreciate most about Atom Stone and his fine debut album is that he isn’t afraid to stand up and say, “I love classic rock.” That’s what is at the heart of this impressive calling card. It may be the classic rock that moves with the times, but it is classic rock, nonetheless.
