Album review: THE NIGHT FLIGHT ORCHESTRA – Amber Galactic

Nuclear Blast [Release date 19.05.17]

There are a good number of bands paying homage to the classic 70′s and 80′s hard rock/AOR/pop sound, with Brother Firetribe (another band who’s members are drawn from heavier sounding bands) and Cats In Space being leading exponents. They can be joined by the Night Flight Orchestra who have released two albums prior to this, their big label debut on Nuclear Blast. The band consist of members of Soilwork, Arch Enemy and Mean Streak – bands who have a much heavier sound than the Night Flight Orchestra!

Vocalist, Soilwork’s Bjorn Speed Strid, fair belts it out on opener ‘Midnight Flyer’, where he sounds uncannily like former Rainbow vocalist Graham Bonnet. Listen out for the OTT keyboards solo as well, staggering stuff.

They really do show their love of 70′s and 80′s melodic rock/AOR with a Survivor bass line on ‘Jennie’ (and on ‘Something Mysterious’, which would be a shoe-in for a ‘Rocky’ soundtrack back in the day), which has a chorus bigger than King Kong’s underpants (should he wear such things!).

‘Josephine’ is another monster of a tune, this time bringing to mind greats such as Journey, Christopher Cross and Toto – loving the guitar solo on this one. Richard Larsson almost steals the show with his keyboards on the song’s outro.

Not content with melodic rock, they unleash their inner disco by way of Kiss, on ‘Gemini’ and ‘Domino’ – both will have you grooving way into the night.

Chances are if you have any albums in your collection from the likes of 70′s/early 80′s Kiss, Survivor, Toto et al, you really do need to check out the Night Flight Orchestra and pronto. ****1/2

Review by Jason Ritchie

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