Maiden Voyage

Flagship are heavily influenced by the melodic prog and hard rock of the 70's, Flagship brings us their debut album. 'Maiden Voyage' delivers music in the vein of Styx, Queen, Slade, Sweet, and of course Kansas. Not only do they cover one of the latter bands songs ("Ground Zero"), they also have the legendary guitarist Kerry Livgren from Kansas as a guest on the track. Flagship is essentially a duo, consisting primarily of Christian Liljegren (Narnia, Divinefire, Wisdom Call, Modest Attraction, Audiovision) and Linus Kåse (ex-Narnia).
For this first effort they also brought in noticeable musicians, such as Carl Johan Grimmark (Narnia, Saviour Machine, Grimmark, Rob Rock), Kristofer Eng (Brighteye Brison) and Mick Nordström (Modest Attraction).
Together they deliver a solid album. 'Maiden Voyage' is a throwback to the more melodic bands of the 70's. Imagine a mix of the dinosaurs of the prog-rock movement, and the 70's glam scene. The songs are long (thus there are only 6 tracks on this CD), and the melodies are the key ingredient.
Expect harmony vocals, and choir arrangements, fluffy melody lines, and a Queen-like approach to mixing genres. I have to say that Flagship does this very well. All of the songs lives up to the expectations for such a band, and leaves you wanting more. Together they now wished to bring in new elements into the music that they hadn't tried out before. To capture the sound they wanted, they now had to pick just the right musicians to bring the right chemistry into the songs.
Flagship wanted to create a fresh sound and production with the roots from the late 1970's but with a touch of the new millennium. Since the song arrangements are very demanding the line-up had to be top notch, with musicians who'd both understand the feel and essence of the songs as well as technically able to actually perform them. Hence the Flagship team was completed with the help of other proficient musicians.
Flagship have signed good record deals with Art Union in Japan for the Asian market and Metal Heaven in Germany to push it more in Europe/USA and outside Scandinavia where the album is released by Christian Liljegren's label Rivel Records.

Lineup

Christian Liljegren (Modest Attraction, Narnia, Wisdom Call, Divinefire, Audiovision, 7days, Golden Resurrection) - Lead Vocals
Linus Kåse (Narnia, Änglagård) - Keyboards

Guest Artists

Carl Johan Grimmark (Modest Attraction, Narnia, System Breakdown, Rob Rock, Empire 21) - Guitars
Kerry Livgren (Kansas, AD, Protokaw) - Guitars
Michael Rank Jensen - Acoustic Guitars
Kristofer Eng (Brighteye Brison) - Bass
Mick Nordström (Modest Attraction, XT) - Drums
Björn Klingvall - Violin/Viola
Thomas Vikström (Candlemass, Stormwind, 7days, Mehida) - Backing Vocals
Per Hallman (Brighteye Brison) - Backing Vocals