Tag: Review

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Michael Schenker Group Rock News

Michael Schenker Group – Immortal Review.

Michael Schenker Group - Immortal Review
Michael Schenker Group - Immortal Review

Listening to Immortal, the new album from the Michael Schenker Group, there is one thing that I have read quite recently that I simply cannot get out of my head.

Apparently the guy has NOT yet been inducted into the rock and roll hall of fame- I find this incredible!  Surely this cannot be true?!

He is, in my opinion, one of the top three guitar players I have ever heard.

I find myself listening for all the guitar work above everything else( it has always been the way when I listen to anything written by or played on by Schenker).

That is not to say that the album is bad at all. I like it. There are some really great songs on it . My own favourites include Don’t Die On Me Now , Devil’s Daughter and Sail  The Darkness.  Overall it is a really nice collection of good rock songs with a couple of slower ballads thrown in as well.

In Search Of The Peace Of Mind is  a lovely little hat tip to the 70s Scorpions days.

It  may sound as though I am being a bit dismissive of the actual songs and I do not mean to be at all. I believe Immortal is as good as some of Schenker’s earlier work and  would deserve about a 7 out of ten.

The thing that probably pushes it up to an eight or nine is the  guitar playing. It is unmistakeable melodic and lyrical. Schenker seems to avoid the over technical barrage of notes that some strive for. He sound totally effortless and the work fits with the songs beautifully.

Some of the picking in the slower After The Rain is stunning and takes me back to High Flyer from the album Force It and maybe also Love To Love from the slightly later Lights Out .

Lockdown cannot end quickly enough for a lot of far more important reasons than live music, but seeing another live performance from this man will be very near the top of my To Do list.

The songs on Immortal will fit in well with any other that are included in a live set.

Michael Schenker is alive and well and still shredding like the guitar hero that he always has been.

Go and buy this and just listen to a guy who is a master of his craft, doing what he does best. It will make you realise that form is temporary but class is permanent- and Michael Schenker is pure class.

Get your copy of Immortal from Amazon.

Michael Schenker Group - Immortal Review

For all things MSG.

http://www.michaelschenkerhimself.com
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James Griffiths 2Michael Schenker Group – Immortal Review
– By James Griffiths

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Matt Peach Rock News

Matt Peach – Epiphany Review.

Matt Peach - Epiphany Review 2
Matt Peach - Epiphany Review 2

Some things just do not seem fair. The one big thing I have never understood is the random nature of bands / artists actually becoming a success. Radio play and media acceptance is a total lottery.

I can say for sure that it is not just based on talent and enthusiasm. I am not saying that all successful bands are undeserving- I tend to look at it from the opposite viewpoint, that many very talented musicians are in danger of slipping through the net.

I really hope that this does not happen with Matt Peach. I believe his latest album, Epiphany, may well go a long way to making sure that it will not.

I must, once again, declare an interest here. Matt is not a new artist to me. I have been listening to him and watching him play live for some years. This, however, does not colour my opinion of this new offering.

Listening to Epiphany is a really happy experience. There are some songs on here that will be familiar from live shows, such as Cut Our Teeth (the new single) and One Night in Paris. Even if they are not already known to new listeners, there are accessible and well written.

The whole album is a collection of great pop/rock songs that deserve a much wider audience.

One of my highlights is Guy Bueno- a great story about Matt himself being rescued from a drunken, quite scary situation by a total stranger.

Listen to this album. It will make you smile. The songs are great, and the playing / musicianship is fantastic. It is also worth checking out Blue Skies – a previous album- and his Christmas song – Rock and Roll Christmas. The latter is great fun that should be on everyone’s yuletide playlist.

Go and buy Epiphany and check out Matt live as soon as COVID allows it. Maybe we can all do something small in the name of enabling talent to rise to its deserved level. I really hope that this happens with Matt.

For Matt Peach merch Click Here

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Diamond Head Rock News Uncategorized

Lightning to the Nations 2020 – A Review.

Lightning to the Nations 2020
Lightning to the Nations 2020

Lightning to the Nations 2020
I cannot remember exactly when, but I saw Diamond Head live at the Southampton Gaumont ( some time in the early 80s) and I have been a fan since. They were always a bit overlooked at the time, but produced some great work.

I especially like Borrowed Time and ( yes I know I shouldn’t say it! ) Canterbury but Lightning to the Nations is also one of their stand out albums.

So now we have the 2020 version- A full 40 years on from the original and supplemented by four covers( Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin , Judas Priest and Metallica) as a kind of homage to what was going on at the time of writing the original album.

Lightning to the Nations has been cited by none other than Lars Ulrich as the catalyst for Metallica and has also been heralded as one of the pioneering works in what became known as the Mew Wave of British Heavy Metal.

The album has been rerecorded and the sound is AMAZING. Some of the riffs and vocals here are of the highest order and it is easy to see why the original album was the start of something big- for rock music in general if not, unfortunately for the band itself.

Commercial success was achieved to an extent but possibly not as much as they deserved.

For fans of the band, this is a  trip down memory lane to listen to a great set of songs. For those that missed out the first time, this is well worth a listen- Am I Evil is still, in my humble opinion, one of the best metal songs ever written.

I have to say I miss Sean Harris. He was the vocalist that I know and I liked his voice a lot. Take nothing away from Rasmus Bom Anderson who has a fantastic voice and fits brilliantly with the rest of the band.

Singers move on for lots of reasons and we would  have lost Queen, AC/DC and  Deep purple years ago( to name but a few )if this didn’t happen.

The different vocalist is not reason to ignore the album or to denigrate it but it is- for me – different and new. I have rediscovered the band as a result of this rerelease and for that I am very grateful.

The album deserves to be thought of as a solid piece of work – the rough edges have now been removed and it is  a reminder of where some aspects of rock music today took a lot of its influence from.

Go listen! Do not forget Borrowed Time and Canterbury as well ( although be prepared for the latter to be a bit of a medieval surprise!)

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