There was a time, long ago, when Metal existed not in these lands. When even the mighty Scandinavian bastions of Metal did not exist. Jokes aside, though Scandinavia is renowned for its metal there have been plenty of acts that were not metal. One such act is ALIEN, the rock group from Gothenburg, Sweden, and their vocalist Jim Jidhed who has produced many solo act albums. And speaking of, today I get to present his newest solo act "Push On Through." I have described other albums similarly, but this act is a blast from the past who will find a home in the heart of those who loved 80s rock acts and screams the 80s groove rock and those who like to explore the root sounds of Power Metal. Without further ado, I'll dive right in.

The album opens with "Glorious", a track with what I consider a great chorus that manages to find a way into my music tastes. Very melodic and upbeat, as groove rock is, the track does very well to open the album and establish what you can expect onward from this track, though it is arguable faster and more technical than other tracks. Following this is the namesake of the album "Push On Through", which, by comparison, is far slower. Starting with a more country-esque opening, the track is definitely far slower by comparison and is far more comparable to an 80s love song track (which is basically is, but compare it to an 80s movie where the protagonist and his love interest are singing about each other staring into the night sky cliche). "Waiting For Summer" is similar, featuring a heavier emphasis on piano and slower, somber repeating guitar riffs. Later into the track you begin to hear synth riffs that sound reminiscent to the ones found in "Glorious" that become more prominent as the track slowly ramps up in intensity, for lack of a better term, until it begins to subdue again as the track closes out.

I will admit, there does come a point where the album sounds a bit like 80s music cliches that lack originality, such as in the track "One Breath". Think of 80s-isms like kind of overly cliche lyrics about love and running away, synth/piano usage that is the same riff in differing tunes, moments that slow down and focus on rhythm acoustic guitar that become more upbeat but say the same thing, and other such things. The vocal style of Jim Jidhed does not help here, though it is how he became famous in the first place being a famous vocalist for an 80s band. It could be more in the structuring and some of the riffs than the song itself, because, by comparison, I found "Too Many Words" far more original though it contains some of the same things (though admittedly fewer). The song more easily catches your ear, though it does experience the same problem at times where it too sounds a bit uninspired and unoriginal. Of course though, as I said it is less of a problem here when listening to this track. Admittedly though, once you get to "Drowning" you notice something. The synth you hear at the beginning sounds oddly like another 80s song. Perhaps a few, but like one or two in particular. It kind of exacerbates the problem really. The song otherwise is decent enough but falls victim to the same cliches I mentioned before, and just sounds uninspired, but it is easy to find problem with how similar the opening sounds to others 80s tracks. Finally though, the track closes with "It Is What It Is", which is pretty good. However, it does walk a fine line between being inspired by tracks like "Stairway to Heaven" (specifically its opening) by Led Zeppelin and sounding exactly like its opening. However, depending on what you think it still sounds great in its slower and more somber sound.

For those who like 80s rock, this album is very good and highly recommendable. However, I stand by my words of saying the album starts off good but kind of fades to a more uninspired sound as it gets closer to its closing. Regardless, for what it aims to be it is good (if feeling unoriginal) and can easily find a crowd among fans of this type of rock.