David's new album starts off with searing guitars and a fresh, gutsy new voice we've never heard alone. David's vocals have good range and strength from the mids to the highs. "Stay" is one of the three rockers on this album, which begs the listener to "stay with me"--an appropriate message to the Christian metal community as they consider listening to David's new music. If this song was the total indicator, he'd have no problem holding his old audience.
"I See Red", the next track, keeps up the urgent pace with colorful guitar work that seems to weave in one channel and out the other creatively. The BGV's are nice and full, giving a big sound on the choruses.
The third song, "Where Are You Now", starts off with some pounding drums and then transitions into a good guitar hook. So far, so good. It's metalheads 3: soft rock 0. David's vocals stretch a little here, showing us more of his range. His passion is captured well in this song. Some of his leads in this song are layered with a cool sounding acoustic track, a touch we heard on Rock In A Hard Place.
The fourth song, "Why Me", starts off with a synthesized hook that preludes a gentle ballad with emotion that matches the lyrical desperation: "Why me, Lord?" It segues right into "The Other Side" with an ethereal keyboard sequence. Comparisons to Pink Floyd are somewhat valid, because of the background crescendos and some of the pouting lead breaks; yet this song maintains a major/positive feeling throughout.
The intro to "Diversity" sounds uncannily like "Who Pulled The Strings", from the Zion album that David produced. Wonder why...
"You" is an upbeat, pop love song to God. "To The End" is a ballad with an ebbing guitar intro that bursts into joyful guitar shrills. David pours out his vocals with passion here, defying the allegation that he's selling out. "Only Eyes" is an acoustic ballad that adds electric instruments as the song goes on. "Spirit Of The Lord" closes the album with some ethereal, Terry Taylor-type flowing keyboards.
This is a good album. Like David said, it takes awhile to adjust to the change before you can appreciate what it is. It's not metal, but after six complete listens it sounds good to me.