Operation Phoenix

Operation Phoenix is the second album, delivered by Frontiers on 27 January 2023. The biggest change is the line-up: Love Magnusson, who had played only solos on the debut, joined as a full lead guitarist. The 2022 EP Live from Studio Gröndahl had already shown the five-piece playing together, so the shift from project to actual band is documented as it happened. Jona Tee produced again. The label claimed the band had bested themselves, and the songs are indeed tighter than the debut, with more metal in the mix. Eleven tracks run about forty-five minutes. The title track, past five and a half minutes, opens up, and the run into “Champions” and “In the Name of the Fallen” sets AOR polish and power-metal drive side by side from the start. Through the straight charge of “Super Trooper” and “Victorious,” the melodic feeling of “Juliette,” and the closing “Northern Lights,” every song is short and takes the shortest route to its hook. That same year the band made its Sweden Rock Festival debut — proving on a stage that this was not an assembly on paper.