When does a band stop being a band? It’s a moral dilemma that plagues the metal community with each passing year, as lineups continue to mutate, key members of bands exit the fold, or worse yet, pass away. I’ve heard this argument levied against cult Swiss hard rockers Gotthard, and I’ve always found it a bit unfair. Now for those out of the know (AKA my fellow Americans), Gotthard first hit the scene in 1992 as the rightful heirs to the Whitesnake throne. Their self-titled 1992 debut is a hard and heavy masterpiece, and the albums that followed in its wake are almost equally as compelling.
Unfortunately, this reign came to a dramatic halt in 2010, upon the passing of frontman and principal songwriter, Steve Lee. In the years since, Gotthard have marched onwards, continuing to tour the fest circuit and release albums with new singer Nic Maeder at the helm. The results of this second act have been…OK. Even despite the obvious shift in dynamic, I gave Gotthard the benefit of the doubt, and rooted them on from the sidelines, hoping they could come storming out of the gate with another Gotthard, or Dial Hard, or Lipservice. Their latest album, Stereo Crush, is not that at all. In fact, it’s about as split down the middle of an album as one could as for.
The half of Stereo Crush that’s good is exactly that. Not great, not amazing, and certainly not kickass, but good. “Thunder & Lightning” and “Liverpool” power pop around in the same manner as Bryan Adams, the former being stronger than the latter. “Boom Boom” and “Shake Shake” are big dumb fun, reminding us how much Gotthard set the stage for the modern day anthems of bands like Eclipse and H.E.A.T, while “Devil in the Moonlight” is the sole moment that sounds cherrypicked straight out of the band’s ’90s heyday, sleazy, sexy, and swaggering. In a perfect world, the whole album would’ve been in this vein. That said, you probably know how the rest of the story goes.
The glut of Stereo Crush owes less to Gotthard’s melodic roots and more to the faceless “active rock” that I thought was exclusive to middle America. Look no further than the atrocious “AI & I” and an absolutely cringeworthy cover of The Beatles’ classic, “Drive My Car” (talk about committing a cardinal sin!). I guess “Rusty Rose” would be the strongest of this bunch, but even that sounds a little too Alter Bridge-ish for its own good. As for the rest of Stereo Crush, think snoozer ballads all the way, chockful of banal lyrics and copy-paste arrangements. No “power” to be found here!
I hate to think that the Gotthard I know and love passed away with Steve Lee, but 15 years and a series of questionable albums later, it’s hard to persuade me otherwise. Stereo Crush might just be the straw that broke the camel’s back in this regard. For any other hard rock act, this would be an inoffensive slab of mediocrity, one that didn’t affect me one way or the other. For Gotthard, it’s a painful disappointment, and a mere shadow of a once glorious past.
5 out of 10
Label: Reigning Phoenix Music
Genre: Hard Rock
For fans of: D-A-D, Eclipse, H.E.A.T
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