Singles Roundup: Anette Olzon, Orden Ogan, The Wonder Years, & Black Country Communion

Let's reach into the grab bag once again:

Anette Olzon - Heed The Call

Despite the consistency of some of the factory writers, there are obviously going to be highs and lows when you're pumping out as much music as they do. For some reason, Anette Olzon seems to get the weakest material Magnus Karlsson has to offer. Her previous solo album was decent, but much less melodic and hooky than either of the records she made with Russell Allen, for instance. This song is hinting at another album in that style, with Anette being given a fairly weak chorus to sing, while the rest of the song is trying to be far heavier than her voice would indicate.

The inclusion of harsh vocals is the biggest sticking point. Anette has a special voice, and I simply don't understand why Magnus and the label would want to take attention away from her on her own album. People would be listening to an Anette Olzon album to hear Anette Olzon, so give us more of her doing what she does best. Songs like this aren't suited to her as well as a song like "Cold Inside" off the first Allen/Olzon record. Give us an album of this, it might be Album Of The Year. This is mostly disappointing.

Orden Ogan - My Worst Enemy

I'll give Orden Ogan credit for one thing; it's a bit daring for a metal band to make the first single for their album a ballad. It I've learned anything listening to people who proclaim themselves 'metalheads', it's that they hate ballads. Maybe the band has realized the same thing I have, which is that their records have become more and more interchangeable over the years, so they needed to do something to make this one stand out from the rest. In that respect, it does.

What they have going for them is that they are good writers of ballads, so this song is more engaging to me than another of their chugging stompers. Those are fun, but they have so many that sound too much alike at this point. This ballad, however, is able to build up from its slow start. By the time the guitars kick in for the crescendo, I'm buying in. Perhaps this strategy is already working.

The Wonder Years - Year Of The Vulture

Even though "The Hum Goes On Forever" won Album Of The Year from me, it was mostly on the strength of five or six songs, and the rest of their catalog has yet to grab me. That's what I'm feeling when I hear this new single, which has all the right elements, but for whatever reason doesn't grab me in quite the same way. I think it's because the song is stripped down to the bare essentials, it doesn't have enough time to develop the connection I'm looking for. It comes and goes quickly, and without the hook and energy to serve as a stand-alone single. It's a song I feel would work better as an album track connecting a couple of heavier hitters, but that's not how it's presented, so I can't judge it thusly. Or, The Wonder Years might be one of those one-album-wonder bands for me.

Black Country Communion - Stay Free

I never got into this 'supergroup' (Have I mentioned enough over the years how much I hate that term?), and this song makes me glad I wasn't waiting for them to return. Between Glenn Hughes being 'the voice of rock', and Joe Bonamassa being a blues-rock legend, what led them to make a song that sounds more like a funky disco track? It's a bizarre little number, boasting an almost dance beat, little muscle, and nothing of interest for Glenn to sing. It almost sounds like they were trying to rehab the image of "I Was Made For Loving You", but don't have a fraction of the songwriting talent KISS had. That's saying something, because I don't exactly have much respect for KISS. This is one to avoid.