Review | Kronowski – Amber

Independent Release

Adam Kronowski is the name giver and driving force behind this debut. He signed off on all instruments, vocals, songwriting and production, only helped by Tommy Lenzi who contributed the guitar parts. An endeavour many will choke on, but not Adam. Kronowski’s debut `Amber’ is an album that will entice quite a large number of musical addicts.

Amidst a wave of corporate releases from heavy metal institutes such as Bruce Dickinson, Judas Priest and Kerry King of Slayer fame, one has to transcend to stand out to carve their names into the realms of metal. Adam Kronowski is a multi-instrumentalist who does exactly that!

POP SLICKNESS

The music Kronowski cooked up on his debut is modern metal keenly constructed around nesting melodies and powerful riffs and melodies. There’s a pop slickness without losing the heaviness needed to make it broil. Main ingredient in this modernity and melodic tackiness are Adam’s vocals. Clean and with a roughed edge, he refrains to bringing the music to life with great involvement. ,,Clean” sets the example. Great on hooks and melodies, the song packs heavy blisses of doubled down drums, pitch perfect riffs plus ditto solo, and soaring choruses. Instantly nesting is the chorus. Scattering more offbeat, ,,Time to Go” breaks more into pop-territory but packs tremendous urge and pace-shifts. 

Songs like ,,Amber” bring a different poise to the front. Tempo shifts and an impressive guitar lick that crafts into the bridge and chorus. Adam’s vocals are jabbing and on target. The turmoil is excellent, keys added to dense up the melody layers. But that lick… like a Japanese theme popping frontal.

SWINGING INTO ACTION

Heavier on the wallop, ,,Jasmine” pulls forward with drum salvos and a polka-reminiscent (feelgood) dance beat and guitar-melody plough into the riff and drum interaction. Adam’s lyrics and vocal melodies again poignant and nesting. Salvos times two are shot at us in the mega harmonic and hyper melodic ,,Anything at All”. Furious drums in impressive high pace and gallop, while melodically the song keeps bordering with Green Day punk-ish structures. Intense, like death metal punk.

Opening with colorful sound fragment and twisted vocal effects, ,,Dead Man” swings into action. Again, the back-and-forth swing of pace shifts is impressive, without losing sight of those sticky sweet melodic choruses. Keys swirl around the guitar licks, prompting a different off melody second theme, making the song work in awkward mood swings. Another one of those melting solos from Lenzi emphasizes the metal in heavy. Remotely Shinedown and Nickelback come to mind, but it wouldn’t do justice to the originality of Kronowski. Just check out how ,,Part of the Plan” blends moods and ingredients of both, but hits so much more pop and melody. 

PART I, II, III

In terms of poppiness, Kronowski balances a fine line with ,,End of the World” checking all boxes of metal, pop and modernity, exactly where ,,Coming Home” raises the stakes even further with its infectious bridge and towering harmonies in the chorus. Absolutely exquisite. Bringing a nineties keyboard melody forward to open the riff driven broil of ,,The Gauntlet”, the song fuses styles. A Baby Metal vibe with intense modern flings and low growl from Adam injecting uncorking the bliss of heaviness.

,,Change You – Pt. I” is boyband material bordering with metal. You feel it building towards its explosion and totally unexpectedly falling back into its piano atmosphere. It is the opening part of 4 piece that shoots into orbit with ,,What’s a Man to Do – Pt. II”, with its heavy riffs and gritty sections. The chorus oozes comfort contradicting with the songs strutting heavy thrive. It is a break of styles that finds laurels in the raw riffed monster ,,The Way – Pt. III” with its bedazzling guitar licks that suddenly fall into a halt with Adam taking the helm with slick melodic chanting and wonderful melodic vocal lines. The riffs brought forward over the raining jazzy keys throw you off completely, pressing more of Kronowski’s uniqueness. 

PART IV

More musical perfection is showered upon us in Lenzi’s solo and the rhythmic puzzled beats, switching percussive parts and dynamics constantly, morphing into the Grande finale full of progressive wonder. Pitching piercing heights, the guitar falls into ,,On and On – Pt IV” with a wonderful endured guitar lick that transcends into a powerful melody, harshly falling prey to another mood swing. Toning down Adam is backed by acoustic guitars and his vocal works are intricate, locking in on the melody of its chorus in singer-songwriter tenure. The keys in the back ebb waves of melodies crashing onto the toned back surrounding of piano and guitar. Suddenly it all erupts again. Towering chant atop a heavy gutted keyboard line with guitars crashing forward a melodic lick that nests instantly. In this heavy bliss the song dies out remotely while piano takes centre stage again, underlining the nobility of Kronowski’s musical journey.

KRONOWSKI – THE CONCLUSION

`Amber’ is outside of all predictability and pushes borders. The musical diversity is wide and pop lurks in the spotlights with in the dark surrounding unleashing heavy and death metal onto the listener. It feels comfortable even though the heaviness is unmeasurable and tight. There’s a remote reminiscence to Shinedown, but Kronowski is way too stubborn to cave into copying.

He is unique and this guy will leave a mark on music for the future. 

Release date: 22 February 2024