STEPHAN GEORG is a German guitarist that has had a lot of time on his hand during the current pandemic. How else would he be able to release three albums in just over 18 months. There have been a lot of albums with people using guest singers and players. They all have had different measurements of success. It all depends if the music played can gel with the people singing. So is STEPHAN GEORG successful with "The Fire Still Burns"? I'm not sure, as I feel it varies quite a lot per song. And per vocalist.

First off I must admit that he has chosen well to play pure heavy metal with melodic touches. This kind of music does complement the voices being used on the album. And, as expexted, some work quite well, like Alexx Stahl on "Revenge Of The Witch", Lisa Mann on "Lonely Flower" and David Reece on "Valley Of The Knights" and "Sunrise Avenue". In those songs you can really hear eveything come together in the way it was intended. On the other hand, the songs "Kickin It" and "Zero Tolernace", with Lydia Pané, are the ones with the biggest issues. In my eyes the vocalist should adapt their singing to the music, and not the other way around. It sounds to me as if Stephan Georg however has changed the music to accommodate her, and it has resulted in the least favourable songs on the album.

The rest of the music fits somewhere in between the ones just mentioned. It's all quite good, but not exceptional. On the other hand, then man does know how to write songs, so I expect him to keep on getting better. Conclusion is that all put together "The Fire Still Burns" is a very pleasurable album.