Review: Peterified – Trial By Fire

Peterified Music (October 24^th, 2025)

Reviewer – Chris O’Connor

 When AOR/Melodic Rock albums are offered up by The Boss at Rockposer Dot Com – I am often the first to pop my head over the parapet and say “I’ll have a crack at this”. The thing is though, going in completely blind, you really don’t know what you are getting to get. It’s like buying a box of mixed fireworks … some explode gloriously, some are colourful and exciting, some are just satisfying while others sort of fizzle yet never quite ignite – can you see where I’m going with this?

Hailing out of Mölndal, (near Gothenburg) in Sweden, the band is a quintet fronted by Peter Johannsson, and joined by his brother Mikael (guitars), Mattias Ingvarson (keyboards), Johan Wallerstedt (bass guitar) and Anton Roos (drums). The album is nicely produced by Victor Olsson (Gathering Of Kings/Saffire) and is mastered by Thomas ‘Plec’ Johansson (Nestor, Gathering Of Kings, Evergrey, Soilwork, The Night Flight Orchestra, Perfect Plan, The Germs etc).

I absolutely hate being negative about albums, as I’m not a musician, and therefore could not do anything myself, but there are things here that do need addressing critically. Firstly, Peter has a pleasant voice, but nothing more – he is very one dimensional, and his range is very limited. Next, his lyrics – anyone who includes such asinine lyrics as “blah blah blah” needs shooting! What on earth? This is the best he could come up within the confines of a song? It’s seriously just poor.

The music is okay, but again, that’s all it is, the band clearly aims for the territory occupied by Journey, Meatloaf, Bryan Adams and even Queen, but on the whole, it’s just one dimensional and frankly safe. You can’t try to join the greats when you seem to lack genuine star quality. Look, the band has talent, you can’t deny them that, but right now, they lack the collective ‘x-factor’ that can carry them to the next level. I don’t want to be unduly unkind, as they have clearly put a lot into this debut, but if they are to progress further, then a serious rethink is in order.

Normally, if you regularly read my reviews on here, you will know I tend to do a track-by-track breakdown, but this time, I honestly can’t, as it would be an endless list of criticisms, which would bore any reader senseless. There are a couple of genuine good moments, I would direct you to the first “proper” track ‘Dangerous Curves’ which is pretty good, ‘Together Tomorrow’ is a nice ballad, ‘Point Of No Return’ is cool musically, but is let down by poor lyrics, and album coda ‘Coming Home (Mill Valley)‘ is very tasteful. As for the rest? I would urge extreme caution.

In a year when we have had genuine very big hitters by the likes of Timson AOR, Streetlight, FM, and First Light, ‘Trial By Fire’ falls very much into the also ran category occupied by a few other acts. If this review has seemed unnecessarily harsh, it wasn’t intended to be so, but sometimes you just have to be objective and clinical. If the band records another album, I will watch with interest, but they need to step up their game in the process.

Tracklisting: 

1. The Calm Before The Storm (Praefatio)
2. Dangerous Curves
3. Stole My Heart Away
4. Never Mind
5. Weekend Lover
6. In God We Trust
7. Capital City Girl
8. Helpless
9. On My own
10. Together Tomorrow
11. Point Of No Return
12. Coming Home (Mill Valley)

Line-up:

Peter Johansson – vocals

Mikael Johansson – guitar

Mattias Ingvarson – keyboards

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