【Pls look at the top comment first】Cleopatra, an ultra rare name coming out in the mid 1990s. The majority might be unacquainted with the band Cleopatra from Sweden. Anyway, it's never too late to know such a precious band and their indie-released debut. I think the greatest image of Cleopatra must be the queen worship of Egypt. Here the Swedish "Cleopatra" must be the rarest to be known by the world.

Released in 1995, this debut "Chapter One" contains both 1980s nostalgic styles and 1990s modern styles. Because the years during the mid 1990s were the transitional periods for music styles in melodic rock. Here "modern" is a relative term, which means music works from mid to late 1990s sound different from those in 1980s, because there come distinctive features during each period of time with the border of certain year. Mostly, melodic rock created in the late 1980s and the early 1990s have the most intercommunities.

I select "I'm In Love" with catchy and bright tunes as my recommendation, because this song is what I heard fully covering the 1980s nostalgic features on its arrangements. It sounds quite similar to another gem "On And On" in tunes, taken from "Chapter One". I post "On And On" at the top-right corner on this video's card, which I uploaded before.

Cleopatra originally was formed as a five-piece band including the duo guitarists (one of them by the vocalist) and the keyboardist. This line-up recorded "Chapter One". In 1996, they released the second album "Rain" minus one guitarist. By comparison, I think most people prefer this debut to the second one. Both "I'm In Love" and "On And On" from the debut truly stand out.

The lead vocalist as well as the guitarist of Cleopatra is Kristian Hermanson. He is the son of jazz musician Christer Hermanson. After the band Cleopatra was finished off, Hermanson became a member of Swedish pop group Friends. The genre of Friends is called "dansbandsmusik", a Swedish term fused with rock, swing and schlager. As a singer and songwriter, his musical activities spread in Nordic Europe in the noughties onwards with his first solo single "A Brand New Day" released in 2006, which takes on a style as a hybrid of the Beatles and Queen.

On the whole, this album contains lively tunes fused with big keys and strong guitar works. Even some of the tracks cover the sounds from brass as the ingenious features inspired by jazz music. For example, the 6th track "How Many Time" features trombone on the solos, followed by splendid guitars then, a brilliant and pleasant masterpiece which I highly recommend like the two gems "I'm In Love" and "On And On".

In "Chapter One", does the voice of Kristian Hermanson remind you of David Coverdale from Whitesnake or does the taste of this song somewhat sound like Newman's ultra amazing debut works released two years after Cleopatra debut? I hope everyone could love all these names as treasures for your good taste in hard/melodic rock. Don't judge an album by its cover design as this obscure album cover features an eyesight test on a horse, because treasure is always from the music.
#MelodicRock #aor #KristianHermanson ##Cleopatra

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