There's something weird about artists coming from countries a little bit poor in providing Hard/Heavy music with remarkable representatives. It's weird because if such an artist overcomes his own surrounding's difficulties (lack of technical or academic support, poor promotion and area's press or genre fans) and moves to a more developed country, he builds a strong musical personality with capable technical skills and notable works. In the genre of Hard Rock, Misha Calvin is definitely the man that fits the above description.
Misha was born and raised in Yugoslavia, discovering his love for music in a remarkable low age. Obviously, it wasn't that is for him to fulfill his high expectations in his homeland & decided to grab his Fender Starocaster and travel to London, United Kingdom in the middle of the 80's. After years of devoted practice and endless searching for a contract that could lift up his musical wants. At that time a contract with Vienna Records crossed his way, resulting in his debut CD to be released in 1993. Evolution - apart from the musical part - featured two by-default remarkably plus points. The vocal duties on this CD were shared between Tony Martin (Black Sabbath, Alliance) and Ian Parry (Elegy, Hammerhead, Airrace, Vengeance). What a start...
Now reissued by Majestic Rock label, Evolution features a guitarist indisputably capable of delivering shredded solos, with an in-your-face aspect and - thank God - not neoclassical-ish, backed up by firm riffing filled with sentiment and bare expressions Misha is not the type of guitar player willing to fill all playing CD time with millions of notes. I think he has the where-to-put-whatcriteria (hmmm...), so as to prevent himself from being heard repetitive. Apart from that, as mentioned above, Tony Martin and Ian Parry deliver an - as usual - grand perfomance, addding that heavy vein in the remainig more melodic instruments section.
The Evolution CD, recorded in three different studios, contains 6 bonus tracks of the band's studio sessions. Thus, 16 songs present a well-recorded, maturely-played, sincerely-delivered release of sounds similar to Ten's early works, Pretty Maids' melodic moments and Shy's or Joshua's endlessly flowing heavy-into-hard guitar and keyboards work. All this, under the usual Journey spirit just to keep in line. Evolution proved to be a popular seller, especially in Japan, so this re-release maybe aims to climb to a higher level. Why not? For the fan of solid melodic hard rock, I can quote clearly: it's a fine target.