THREE WISHES: "Obsession"

Rating: 7/10

Three Wishes 2011

Review by Kimmo Toivonen

These days we rarely get unsolicited CDs to review, and when we do, it's usually death metal from Poland or something equally unsuitable for RockUnited. Once in a while someone does manage to catch us by surprise by being right up our alley. Three Wishes are the latest "nice surprise" - their melodic hard rock is something that should appeal to many of our readers.

Although "Obession" is the bands' fourth album, I don't think I've ever heard of them before. With an open mind I put the CD to the player, and the first bars of "Living A Lie" proved right away that this certainly isn't Polish death metal. Hard rocking guitars, colourful keyboards and vocalist who at his best sounds like L.A. Greene's (Harlan Cage, Fortune) german cousin!

With 15 songs, this album is too long for its own good, hence the rating. If you skip over the weaker tracks, there's still plenty to like. Keyboard player Arthur Quaku is the star of the show for me, adding a lot of athmosphere to the songs. And the songs then... they range from the outstanding melodic rock of "Save My Soul" to the slightly proggy "New Tomorrow", mostly staying on the more melodic end. In my opinion, that's where the band is at its' best, the more "tricky" tracks don't sound natural.

The band has produced the album themselves, and I think it shows a little. An outside producer might have told them to drop a few of the lesser tracks. Also, some of the songs suffer of a bit cluttered mix, there seems to be too much going on. But enough of my nitpicking, an album with such tracks like the aforementioned "Save My Soul" and "Living A Lie", "Fight" or "Red, Hot And Wicked" is worth of your attention. Especially those of you who enjoyed the albums of CITA back in the late nineties should investigate.

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