These Swedish young guns have certainly served up a delectable debut album...

More quality Melodic Hard Rock from Sweden as the Scandinavians continue on their quest for "World Domination" in this genre of music. I was particularly excited about getting to review this album when I read about the involvement of Erik Mårtensson (Eclipse, W.E.T.) who mixed and mastered the album as, in my opinion, just about everything this multi-talented musician touches, over the last few years, turns to gold. With SunStrike we have another classy, Melodic Rock release very much in the vein of H.E.A.T, Reckless Love and Eclipse: catchy, Hard Rock melodies with huge memorable choruses.

Lead singer Christian Hedgren will be familiar to those who have heard last year's excellent 'Strange Nostalgia' album by The Theander Expression where Hedgren shared vocal duties with one of the all-time greats, Göran Edman. Hedgren formed SunStrike together with Johan Lindstedt (drums and backing vocals) and Jachim Nordlund (lead guitar) who are both from Swedish Metal band Astral Doors. The band is completed by Fredrik Plahn (keyboards), Bjorn Lundqvist (bass) and Mats Gesar (guitars).

The opening two tracks 'Power Of The Dreams' and title-track 'Rock Your World' originally appeared as demos on the band's Facebook page and immediately caused a bit of a stir in the Melodic Rock community. The former starts with a Bon Jovi style riff and sets out the band's intentions from the start whilst the latter is a huge, Stadium Rock anthem.

The album has perfect pacing, alternating between aggressive Melodic Rock, AOR and power ballads. With 'Fireball' the band Gott-hard, but was soon back on the 'Right Track' with Reckless Love style AOR. SunStrike then turned up the H.E.A.T. with my favourite track, the ultra-catchy 'Roll The Dice' – one of the songs of the year to date. 'Rock It Out' is a real Treat whilst 'Never Let You Go' is a little bit W.E.T.

Hedgren, whose vocals are superb throughout, really excels himself on the power ballad 'Higher'. The rest of the band did not want to be Eclipse(d) and 'Scream & Shout' on the next Melodic Hard Rocker. 'Into The Light' is pure AOR Danger Danger followed by The Magnificent AOR of 'Edge Of Life' and the album rocks to a fantastic conclusion with 'Heat Of The Night'.

A mention also should be made of the fantastic artwork courtesy of Carl-André Beckston. These Swedish young guns have certainly served up a delectable debut album for the lovers of any of the bands mentioned within the review. SunStrike one!

Mark Donnelly