Artist : COMPASS

Album : Our Time on Earth

Release Date : 24-04-2020

Added : 05-06-2020

‘Steve Newman’ is known to have created the A.O.R. project 'NEWMAN' with a last opus just released in March 2020, 'Ignition' and, in 2017, he decided in parallel with' NEWMAN ' to leave in another musical direction and he therefore created a new project 'COMPASS' concretized by a first opus 'Our Time on Earth' which was born at the end of April 2020. He took with him the bassist 'Dave Bartlett' from 'NEWMAN' and 'Ben Green' and 'Toni Malush' complete the line up, respectively to the vocals and drums.

This new project allowed him to get out of the often limited durations of the A.O.R. by particularly expanding his writing with much denser titles with durations ranging from 5 to 10 minutes while retaining this talent for beautiful melodies that can be tamed immediately. 'Skies of Fire', nearly 9 minutes long, begins the album with a catchy title and a nice alternation between energetic sections and other quieter ones which bring a progressive side to the whole thanks in particular to more developed instrumental parts. In the same style, we can cite ‘Caught in a Frame’, ‘Neon’ or ‘Another Life Suicide’ which are a kind of mixture between melodic rock and progressive metal. In the same style, we can cite ‘Caught in a Frame’, ‘Neon’ or ‘Another Life Suicide’ which are a kind of mixture between melodic rock and progressive metal. But, it is with compositions that are the most distant from the A.O.R. that 'Steve Newman' surprises us the most, with, first of all the two parts of 'Our Time on Earth' which, while keeping an accessible melodic side, mix atmospheric and progressive parts, then, with 'The Preacher And The Pigeon Feeder', alternates sweet parts and others more energetic with a magnificent guitar solo in the middle of the title. As for 'A Warning From History', it is undoubtedly the most progressive of the album with remarkable instrumental passages and it is in this composition that we feel most the break in composition of Steve with 'NEWMAN'.

In summary, with this new project, 'Steve Newman' shows us that he has several strings to his bow : we knew his talent for unstoppable melodies in an 'AOR' style and we discover with this opus that it also has this ability to offer us richer and more complex compositions bringing a progressive side while keeping this sense of melody and 'Our Time on Earth' should please a fairly large audience navigating between melodic and progressive rock...

Line Up / Musicians

Steve Newman (Guitar, Keybords), Ben Green (Vocal), Dave Bartlett (Bass), Toni Lakush (Drums)