“Astralism” is the third album of Swedish Astral Doors. Astralism is a term sometimes used in a spiritual sense. However, "Astralism" in this matter does NOT stand for anything spiritual.
For the band it is more of a statement: a fist in the face, to all crazy religious fanatics in the world, starting wars in the name of God. The band’s message to the world is to stop that shit and start to praise Astral Doors instead. The latter each of us must decide for themselves.

Back to the music; on the first record "Of the son and the father" the band was obviously searching to find their own formula, on "Evil is forever" the compositions were a lot stronger; lyrically it was quite a dark album. With “Astralism” Joachim Nordlund, Patrik Johansson, Johan Lindstedt, Mika Itäranta, Martin Haglund and Jocke Roberg made a dynamic cd with a lot of influences from eighties hardrock (Rainbow, Priest, Leatherwolf). The guitar-tandem Nordlund and Haglund take care of the dynamic riffs, twinguitar playing and guitar solo’s. The keyboards (Roberg) do have a very prominent role for the sound of Astralism.

They are strongly present on every song, not in a very dominant way but they’re clearly indispensable for the Astral Doors-sound. Lindstedt (drums) and Ltäranta (bass) form a strong rhythm tandem. I’m not very charmed by the voice of Johansen, he is singing over the top especially with the fast songs. When the band slows down, his voice is a lot better.

Rainbow is one of my favorite bands of the eighties. When listening Astralism for the first time I was quite surprised I recognized several songs at once. The melodies are very familiar with the fast Rainbow songs, I like that. I almost could sing along with these songs (don’t worry, I didn’t), listen to “EVP”, “Fire in the house” (Spotlight Kid), “Raiders of the Ark”, “Oliver Twist”. “Apocalypse Revealed” is my favorite song, it takes 7:40 minutes and is the longest track of the album with great solo’s, typical keyboards, strong structure and Johansen shows his best voice.
"Astralism" kicks you in your face in a pleasant way, enjoy it.