Review: 11 Theory – All In Our Minds

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Review: 11 Theory – All In Our Minds

WLA Productions – June 19th, 2026

Reviewer – Jason Hopper

11 Theory are set to release their debut album ‘All In Our Minds‘. That’s all I know about the band (I’ll get to that later). Listening to the album, their sound is blues based hard rock performed with the right amount of emotion and arrogance.

Opening track ‘The Other Side’ has that in spades, making it one of my favorite songs of the year. What an absolute blast to crank in the car while driving. This upbeat thumper has an extended bridge to chorus connection that is so sonically pleasing I had to play it a number of times before continuing with the rest of album. I knew that if I didn’t replay it, I would be thinking about replaying it and it would affect the rest of the songs on the album in terms of reviewing.  It’s that damn good!

From there the album does a great job of balancing out the varying tempos, alternating back and forth between more groove-based slower melodies with more sped-up tempos that get the cylinders firing. Following ‘The Other Side’ with the slower but heavier ‘Believing It Too’ is perfect. The track has a late-80s LA rocker sound not dissimilar to what bands like Tesla and Lynch Mob were doing at the time. Yep, I then played this one a few times as well before moving on.

From that terrific start, the album is nearly flawless. While I have some preferred tracks over others, there’s not one weak song in the bunch. Amongst the album heavy hitters, you have the first single, the humorous ‘Shovels and Pitchforks’, which showcases the fun side of the band while skewering critic culture.

‘Midnight Prayer’ has the feel of a ballad but builds to a mid-tempo rocker, the chorus having a whimsical feel with lyrics that are anything but that. The somewhat dark and angry lyrics work well with the lighter tone, making for a nice contrast.

‘Can’t Wait Another Minute’ is an upbeat blast in the vein of Buckcherry. The chorus is quite simple, with just one line repeating, but the melody line and the call and response right after, with the alteration of ‘Yeahhhh ahh ahh!’ with the reprieve of ‘You can’t can’t control me!’ is sure to be a favorite to hear live.

The album has two ballads, the title track and closer ‘You Are’, which is labeled as a bonus track and may not be on all versions of the album. I would suggest seeking it out if it’s not on the version you come across. It’s a simple ditty with some acoustics and percussions. Elegant with alternations of soft and powerful vocals, singer Cris Hodges is front and center selling this song.  He does a brilliant job showing off his skills.

As great as this album is, I struggled with this review for reasons that are absurd. The press release is one of the worst I have ever seen.  It consists of titles of the songs, physical and digital product release dates, and links to websites like YouTube and Facebook. That’s it. Nothing else.

As of this writing, there is no content on YouTube. Facebook has nearly nothing and a laughable explanation of the band.  Here’s the second paragraph:  “Frontman Cris Hodges embodies Californian creativity with a Texan soul. The singer and multi-instrumen”. That’s not a typo. They literally gave up part way through the press information and posted it on Facebook.

It’s frustrating to want to talk about a band and know next to nothing about them. This album is scheduled to be released in less than two months and label WLA Productions is doing piss all to promote the band. These guys have a great sound…and no one is going to hear it with this low effort promotional push. Hopefully this review will help. Check these guys out, their hard rock blues-based sound should not be passed by.

Track list:

  1. The Other Side
  2. Believing It Too
  3. Evil Inside
  4. All In Our Minds
  5. Give Us A Fight
  6. The Way
  7. Shovels & Pitchforks
  8. Midnight Prayer
  9. Can’t Wait Another Minute
  10. How It Ends
  11. You Are (Bonus Track)

Line-up:

Cris Hodges – Vocals

Serguei Fedotov – Guitar

Ilia “Lu” Smirnov – Guital

Sergey “Glam Dickens” Dik – Bass

Sergey Rubtsov – Drums

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