I was surprised to find a new album by Swiss rockers of Pure Inc on my doormat. I knew the band had done some intensive touring in 2005 with Michael Schenker and Masterplan among others. I didn’t know that the band found some time to spare from touring to write and record their second full length album.

I really liked the band’s debut album and I loved the band as a support act of the horrible Michael Schenker gig in 013 Tilburg last year. My first impressions on “A New Days Dawn” were not up to expectations though. One of the main reasons is that the songs on the new album are balladic soft rockers (in the vein of Nickelback and Bon Jovi) or classic hard rock tracks.
What I liked most on the self titled debut was the mixture of these two genres within songs. The only exceptions are the fifth track ‘Burst’; in my opinion the best track by far and “The Thing You Left On Me”.

The vocals of Gianni Pontillo were a slight disappointment. They were warmer, more powerful in my memory. Now they seem over the top most of the time just balancing between singing and shouting.

One aspect that is easy to compare to the debut is the sound quality, again excellent. I totally dig the deep and warm ever clear bass lines by Andreas Gentner and dry drums by Dave Preissel in the mix. Too bad that the compositions have become more mainstream, more alike and worst of all less interesting. There’s only one point where “A New Days Dawn” tops its predecessor. The ballad “I’ll Let You Know” is much better than the horrible “Promise”; in fact it’s one of the better. “A New Days Dawn” is good enough, but the debut was better.