KROSSFIRE – Learning To Fly

Krossfire is a five-piece Power / Progressive Metal band hailing from Plovdiv, Bulgaria. The band was formed in 2001 by guitarist Georgi Koushev and bassist Georgi Driev. The band went through a few line-up changes and played locally for a few years to gain a solid fan base. They eventually released their first single in “Touch Of Destiny” in 2008, which received favorable reviews and ended up as part of a CD compilation for the German magazine “Heavy”. All of this publicity and a barrage of live performances catapulted them to release their debut album Learning To Fly.

The music of Krossfire is extremely epic and theatrical. There are many orchestrated keyboard themes that give the tracks a pretentious, dramatic effect. This is clearly evident from the nearly three-minute instrumental opening “Visions”, which gives an exaggerated sensation of a major motion picture. This actually happens a couple times during the album; preceding the title track “Learning To Fly” is a similar two-minute introduction called “Icaria”.

Adding to the many melodramatic themes heard throughout the album is the very over-the-top vocals of Dimo Petkov. Petkov has an extremely bold singing style. He sings with an incredible amount of force and power. There is no question Petkov has an extraordinary amount of talent as a singer… the problem is he contains such a forceful operatic style … it’s just not a great fit for this type of music. When comparing him to similar vocalists like Ralf Scheepers or Hansi Kürsch, they contain a more dynamic element that makes the music move around their words instead of pushing the vocals forward through the music.

Materially, the tracks on Learning To Fly are all very eloquent and written very well. The compositions are well-thought out and have a natural flow. They do an excellent job of incorporating many different styles of Metal. Some of the tracks are relatively melodic and straightforward, while others are very progressive and theatrical. The single guitar riffs from Georgi Koushev are heavy and balanced and feature some outstanding Neo-Classical guitar solos as well.

The major stand out track from this album is the acoustic ballad “The One”. This has a great subtle melody, and it’s actually a duet with Violeta Kousheva who portrays some very enchanting and soft-spoken operatic vocals. Her addition makes this not only the best track on the album, but also the most captivating.

Although there are a few flaws with the overall product and presentation of Learning To Fly, it is an admirable effort for an album that has been three years in the making. Krossfire does need to work on areas to differentiate themselves from sounding too much like every other Power / Progressive band on the market, as well as incorporating more profound and diverse vocals to put them ahead of the pack.