First Spin Impressions

[Glen]

Orianthi-Believe

 

Man talk about a killer pop/shred release...she sings like a bird and shreds like Vai....great songs and some

absolutely killer guitar playing...very pop but who cares...he likes!!!

 

backed...this chick is the business.

[Jez]

Blackwood Creek - S/T

 

It ain't exactly Winger the band sound and it isn't exactly Kip Winger solo either, but it's bloody excellent is what it is. pretty straightforward Guitar Bass Drums 80's rock sound with some fantastic songs and a great groove throughout - check out 'The Revolution', 'Nothing But The Sun' and the excellent acoustic driven 'Wooden Shoe' for starters. Picked it up cheap, but in hindsight, would have paid top dollar for this one.

[TIM (2)]

Orianthi-Believe

 

Man talk about a killer pop/shred release...she sings like a bird and shreds like Vai....great songs and some

absolutely killer guitar playing...very pop but who cares...he likes!!!

 

backed...this chick is the business.

 

I just picked this one up too - this is very cool stuff indeed....

[heaven&hell]

The Codex - S/T

 

Magnus Karlsson+Mark Boals=Excellent Melodic Metal. This one came in 2008 and I remember loving the samples but for some reason just totally forgot to get around to buying it until recently. This is just excellent IMO and is a great middle ground between what Magnus did on the Allen/Lande discs and Progressive Melodic Metal like Masterplan. There some great melodic moments on this like "Whole Again", "Mystery", "Priosner" and "Raise Your Hands". There is also some great heavier tunes mixed in such as "Beyond the Dark", "Toxic Kiss", "Garden of Grief", "Dream Makers" and "Mistress of Death". IMO this rivals the best thing that Karlsson has done and should be placed up there with the Allen/Lande "The Battle" release. Also Mark Boals sounds fantastic on this disc.

[Geoff]

Just have to mention these two dreary new AOR discs, only so no-one bothers buying them...

 

SPIN GALLERY - Embrace

 

High expectations after a killer debut but they come nowhere close to matching it this time around. Weak vocals and a soulless production just kill any decent hooks/melodies on this one. It's also just way too lite and lacks any guts at all. Disappointed not to see Chris Antblad not on this, but be sure his solo disc will slaughter this. Nothing on here is horrible, but there isn't one killer song (unlike the several on the debut) so don't bother.

 

LOS ANGELES - Neverland

 

I wasn't too excited by the first L.A disc, and this one is a whole lot worse! Despite an impressive vocal range the actual singing on here is horrific. I recognise the Richard Marx track (crap) but think the rest are new tunes rather than covers - though I might be wrong. I can't say I care as this is proper dull, and despite some okay-ish hooks/choruses it just isn't going to get repeat spins at all. Have I mentioned the vocals? Fuck me they're awful. Even if you liked the first one I wouldn't rush out and pick this up.

 

Disagree with you on the Spin Gallery I'm afraid TIM. I wasn't blown away on first spin I admit, but after 5 or 6, it is really really good for me now. Loads of great tracks Like 'The End' 'Eyes Wide Open' and 'Blood In My Veins'. Quite different than the debut aswell.

 

The Los Angeles on the other hand, whilst an improvement on the bog standard debut, isn't having the same effect. I didn't think Luppi's vocals were that bad to be honest, but to each their own. Time will tell maybe if this is a keeper or not, but at the moment, it is neither a thumbs up or down.

I'm the other way round. I agree with Tim and think that Spin Gallery CD is total garbage, but I actually really, really like the new Los Angeles disc. But then again, I also really liked the debut too. The new one's even better, though, imo.

[Geoff]

Aphasia ~ 'Fact & Fiction' ; Pretty good's about the best I can offer this. Very good first track and honestly, every other song was good solid modern rock too. There's nothing at all wrong with these guys except maybe being so totally unoriginal may be their downfall, as there is nothing here to set them aside from a hundred other good modern rock bands. Still, it's a good CD and a keeper for sure.

[aMetalhead1966]

Orianthi-Believe

 

Man talk about a killer pop/shred release...she sings like a bird and shreds like Vai....great songs and some

absolutely killer guitar playing...very pop but who cares...he likes!!!

 

backed...this chick is the business.

 

I just picked this one up too - this is very cool stuff indeed....

She also released a CD called Violent Journey.. it's more "instrumental but still has some great songs...

She has a "Santana/Vai" way of playing that is awesome...

[Jez]

Orianthi-Believe

 

Man talk about a killer pop/shred release...she sings like a bird and shreds like Vai....great songs and some

absolutely killer guitar playing...very pop but who cares...he likes!!!

 

backed...this chick is the business.

 

I just picked this one up too - this is very cool stuff indeed....

She also released a CD called Violent Journey.. it's more "instrumental but still has some great songs...

She has a "Santana/Vai" way of playing that is awesome...

 

Backed on 'Violent Journey' - quite different and definitely more mellow, but some nice songs.

[Geoff]

Stanfour - 'Rise & Fall' ; second release from a cool band Glen brought to the forum a few years back. I still enjoy the debut a lot but sadly a decent priced hard copy has eluded me all this time and this still sits on my want list. I was quite excited to see this 2nd release as I wasn't expecting it. Overall, if you liked the debut there's no reason at allyou won't enjoy this. I think this one is a little more consistent, without the dreadful fillers that the debut had a few of. It's also a lot more mellow overall and as well as missing the real duds it also appears to be missing the real clearcut gems the debut had. Overall, though, a lot of good songs here and a good album. Now I need to find both of them!

[Geoff]

Lostprophets - 'The Betrayed' ; Man, what a HUGE disappointment. Wouldn't be surprised to see this end up as the biggest disappointment of the year. This is a band I had huge expectations for. The last CD was great. When I heard they'd recorded and shelved an entire album between that release and this one I couldn't help but wonder why. Having heard this, I wish they'd released the other album and shelved this... whatever it sounds like. On the plus side, there are about 3 truly excellent songs on this CD which sadly only help to showcase what this band is capable of when they want to be good. The majority is just extremely boring modern rock with no good hooks and melodies and just a really bland feel. What a shame. I really want to hear the shelved album now.

 

Alesana - 'The Emptiness' ; A band I've been interested in at a distance. Pretty standard brand of screamo hard rock like The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus or older Silverstein. Honestly, this album sounds a lot better than the last. It's a concept album with a very cool monologue throughout the album with a kind of serial killer storyline. Some cool, violent songs too. In all honesty, I prefer it to the new Lostprophets CD by quite a bit. I don't think it'll be anywhere near the high end of my list come year end, but good, solid album anyway. I'll buy it.

 

Calloused - 'The distance between us' ; Yuck, yuck yuck. Horrible modern rock with only one song worth hearing - 'No wonder'.

[TIM (2)]

Lostprophets - 'The Betrayed' ; Man, what a HUGE disappointment. Wouldn't be surprised to see this end up as the biggest disappointment of the year. This is a band I had huge expectations for. The last CD was great. When I heard they'd recorded and shelved an entire album between that release and this one I couldn't help but wonder why. Having heard this, I wish they'd released the other album and shelved this... whatever it sounds like. On the plus side, there are about 3 truly excellent songs on this CD which sadly only help to showcase what this band is capable of when they want to be good. The majority is just extremely boring modern rock with no good hooks and melodies and just a really bland feel. What a shame. I really want to hear the shelved album now.

 

I've only heard the two singles but I completely agree, they both suck. The band produced this themselves as they weren't happy with a string of big-name producers (suggesting the band are too stubborn to listen to anyone else). I think their last disc was a bit of a never-to-be-repeated one-off great disc...

[TIM (2)]

THROWDOWN - Deathless

 

Nice chunky Metal disc from the band that seems to change it's style with every album. This time they sound like Pantera/Lamb of God with lots of clean vocals and catchy choruses. This is better than their last disc "Venom & Tears" which was poorly produced and a bit generic, even if it's still way behind the A-players in Metal. Anyone disappointed in the last SHADOWS FALL album (lacking in hooks) should check this out....

[Geoff]

Acacia Avenue - s/t ; YUCK, YUCK, YUCK!!! What terrible shit this is. Complete waste of time. The first song with Mills on vocals is okay and there are two songs with the dude from Pangea that ended up sounding okay, but otherwise this is just awful, terribly boring, bland and pointless AOR. Really just hated most of this.

 

Heartlyne - 'No retreat no surrender' ; Good stuff. Pretty standard 80's melodic rock / AOR with Tommy Heart on vocals, but to be totally honest I prefer this to any full Fair Warning CD I've heard. It's safe, it's unoriginal, but it's pretty good stuff. Recommended if you like mid-80's melodic rock/AOR.

 

Naughty Boys - 'R U Naughty Enough' ; seriously, why do these guys have such a glammy name and album title? This is pure, icy cold emotionless Swedish/Finnish melodic hard rock which sounds like all these types of bands at the moment. I'm at such a crossroads with this stuff. It is well played, songs are fine and hooks are solid, good choruses... but where's the passion? Where's a hint of warmth in this stuff? It just sounds so cold and scripted. Hate the vocals too, but I do not mind the CD. It is good stuff, but not as good as the new one. I just wish these bands would learn to sound like they mean it.

[Geoff]

Liberty N Justice - 'Light it up' ; Finally this is by so far the best LNJ release by miles! Up till now they've been pretty patchy and imo forgettable. A decent song here, a good one there but not enough to really get interested in. This time they finally deliver. There's an abundance of great tunes on this one this time around. Some of the highlights include Phil Lewis on 'Light it up' to open things off, this new bird from Vixen singing on 'Blink' was great (never heard her before this), the dudes from Firehouse deliver on 'Do what you believe' (which funnily enough sounds a lot like Firehouse), 'Every reason to believe' with Kelly Keeling is good, 'Wrestling with God' with the guys from Trixter is excellent, 'Beautiful decision' is a much-needed dose of Harem Scarem brilliance from Harry and Pete (man I miss these guys already!), even Marq Torien finally delivers something good on his 'Drunk dead gorgeous' track, 'Greed' with Robert Mason is another gem and is this our very own board member Shawn Pelata from Line of Fire on 'For better or worse'? Man, what a great song - one of the highlights of the CD. Anyway, as I said, countless highlights and the cast reads like a list of who's who of US 80's hard rockers. Ted Poley is there too and his track is okay, but the lyrics are annoying on that tune and to be honest there are so many better songs that one's kind of overlooked. Very good disc.

[TIM (2)]

BULLET FOR MY VALENTINE - 3 Track Advanced CD

 

Not a big fan of this bands last album at all (way too sterile & too many ballads), in fact I thought it pretty much sucked, but I always kinda liked them apart from the rough-as-hell vocals. Sadly the same singer is present here but it's all a little more raw-sounding and no hint of a slower tune on this advance disc. A bit more anthemic than the last disc too, and slightly more like they sound live - as they're a much better live band than you'd ever detect from their pretty poor recordings. Very promising stuff, with "Your Betrayal" being probably the best song they've recorded to date....

[Geoff]

BULLET FOR MY VALENTINE - 3 Track Advanced CD

 

Not a big fan of this bands last album at all (way too sterile & too many ballads), in fact I thought it pretty much sucked, but I always kinda liked them apart from the rough-as-hell vocals. Sadly the same singer is present here but it's all a little more raw-sounding and no hint of a slower tune on this advance disc. A bit more anthemic than the last disc too, and slightly more like they sound live - as they're a much better live band than you'd ever detect from their pretty poor recordings. Very promising stuff, with "Your Betrayal" being probably the best song they've recorded to date....

Wasn't there only one or two ballads on that one? It was generally pretty fast paced if I recall correctly. Anyway, looking forward to the new one!

[TIM (2)]

BULLET FOR MY VALENTINE - 3 Track Advanced CD

 

Not a big fan of this bands last album at all (way too sterile & too many ballads), in fact I thought it pretty much sucked, but I always kinda liked them apart from the rough-as-hell vocals. Sadly the same singer is present here but it's all a little more raw-sounding and no hint of a slower tune on this advance disc. A bit more anthemic than the last disc too, and slightly more like they sound live - as they're a much better live band than you'd ever detect from their pretty poor recordings. Very promising stuff, with "Your Betrayal" being probably the best song they've recorded to date....

Wasn't there only one or two ballads on that one? It was generally pretty fast paced if I recall correctly. Anyway, looking forward to the new one!

 

But the ballads broke-up the album. You'd get 2 or 3 decent up-tempo tunes then a crap ballad. Plus one that was way too near the beginning of the album. Didn't matter much anyway as I didn't really like the faster songs either! The new stuff definitely sounds a bit better, even if they are still a band that's a lot more successful than thousands of similar bands who have far greater talent (IMO of course)....

[Geoff]

BULLET FOR MY VALENTINE - 3 Track Advanced CD

 

Not a big fan of this bands last album at all (way too sterile & too many ballads), in fact I thought it pretty much sucked, but I always kinda liked them apart from the rough-as-hell vocals. Sadly the same singer is present here but it's all a little more raw-sounding and no hint of a slower tune on this advance disc. A bit more anthemic than the last disc too, and slightly more like they sound live - as they're a much better live band than you'd ever detect from their pretty poor recordings. Very promising stuff, with "Your Betrayal" being probably the best song they've recorded to date....

Wasn't there only one or two ballads on that one? It was generally pretty fast paced if I recall correctly. Anyway, looking forward to the new one!

 

But the ballads broke-up the album. You'd get 2 or 3 decent up-tempo tunes then a crap ballad. Plus one that was way too near the beginning of the album. Didn't matter much anyway as I didn't really like the faster songs either! The new stuff definitely sounds a bit better, even if they are still a band that's a lot more successful than thousands of similar bands who have far greater talent (IMO of course)....

Yeah, to be totally honest I though the ballads on the last album absolutely killed anything else on it - by far the best songs.

 

A few recent spins:

 

Lickity Split - 'Stick it in' ; I've had all these demos for years, but nice to get a silver-pressed CD with some good artwork and the tracks sounding a little better. It's not the best or most ground-breaking stuff ever, but good for fans of 80's hair metal. The ballad, 'I'll dry your tears' is the best song on here, but most the rockers are cool too.

 

Mass - 'New birth' ; Nice. I always thought these guys were meant to be a full christian band. Well, they're only as christian as 99% of all the other bands in the world who thank God in their liner notes but manage to keep the bullshit out of the lyrics. This CD was a game of two halves for me. Killer first half which reminded me a little of White Sister, but it dropped off in intensity for the second half of the CD. Overall, still a pretty good hard rocking CD from 1985.

 

Mass - 'Voices in the night' ; Haha, man this sounds like the non-christian version of Stryper's 'In God We Trust' (It is produced by Michael Sweet, from 1988). Haven't finished it just yet, but enjoying what I'm hearing. Needs a few stronger hooks, but it's sounding pretty good. Nice stuff. I really want to get their one album I'm missing now. Disappointed it was sold out at Retrospect.

[Fat Freddy]

Eric Carr - ROCKOLOGY

A posthumous "solo release" from the late KISS drummer, this is a collection of demos/outtakes/odds and ends Eric worked on during his time with KISS -- some were presumably offered to the band as album tracks that didn't make the cut, some were intended for a cartoon show called "Rockheads" that Eric was developing shortly before his death. Bruce Kulick contributed guitar to most of these songs. As you might expect, it's a mixed bag. A couple of the songs don't even have proper lyrics, just Eric "scatting" a bunch of nonsense over the music to show where the lyrics were to be inserted when they were done. An interesting listen on one spin but not something that's bound to become a regular player.

[Geoff]

Mass - 'Voices in the night' ; Haha, man this sounds like the non-christian version of Stryper's 'In God We Trust' (It is produced by Michael Sweet, from 1988). Haven't finished it just yet, but enjoying what I'm hearing. Needs a few stronger hooks, but it's sounding pretty good. Nice stuff. I really want to get their one album I'm missing now. Disappointed it was sold out at Retrospect.

Wow, was the new song good on this one or what?! How come their recent disc on Escape was so ordinary? The track they recorded on this disc, from 2002 or so, is one of their best yet. Shame they didn't really deliver on their last CD.

 

Mass - 'Take you home' ; Nice. Their hardest rocking disc and there is actually a christian song on this one! I wonder if that's why they're considered a christian rock band? Either way, this is a pretty awesome EP, especially the title track.

 

Day of Fire - 'Losing all' ; I don't know if I've heard their 2nd album but the debut is kind of okay. This one just sucks. I thought it was a new lead singer and new band, but no, same guys except for a guitarist. Just crap, shitty grunge rock.

[heaven&hell]

Fozzy - Chasing the Grail

A good album and probably the heaviest thing they've done so far. The drumming really stands out on this. Fav songs so far are "Under Blackened Skies", "Martyr No More" and "Watch Me Shine".

 

Jorn - Spirit Black

Kind of dissapointing and not near as good as the last two discs. Not any bad songs but not near as many good ones either so far. Most of his discs do take me a couple of spins though so hopefully this one grows on me.

 

Leverage - Circus Colossus

Not as stellar as the previous two discs(with Tides being my fav and one of my favs of the decade) but I've actually played this one a few times and it's growing on me. Fav songs are "Movie Gods", "Wolf and the Moon", "Legions of Invisible" and "Revelation".

 

Taking Dawn - Time To Burn

 

This is a kick ass so far. Good solos and good rocking songs. Hopefully this has some staying power. The title track alone is worth the price of admission but there's at least 5 other great songs as well.

[Geoff]

Jorn - Spirit Black

Kind of dissapointing and not near as good as the last two discs. Not any bad songs but not near as many good ones either so far. Most of his discs do take me a couple of spins though so hopefully this one grows on me.

Yeah, I heard this the other day too and as much as I like Jorn, I found myself quite bored with this CD. Definitely one of his weakest yet.

 

Taking Dawn - Time To Burn

This is a kick ass so far. Good solos and good rocking songs. Hopefully this has some staying power. The title track alone is worth the price of admission but there's at least 5 other great songs as well.

Only 5? Cousin, the whole thing is excellent, imo. Except 'The Chain' which is the only slight drawback for me.

[heaven&hell]

Jorn - Spirit Black

Kind of dissapointing and not near as good as the last two discs. Not any bad songs but not near as many good ones either so far. Most of his discs do take me a couple of spins though so hopefully this one grows on me.

Yeah, I heard this the other day too and as much as I like Jorn, I found myself quite bored with this CD. Definitely one of his weakest yet.

 

Taking Dawn - Time To Burn

This is a kick ass so far. Good solos and good rocking songs. Hopefully this has some staying power. The title track alone is worth the price of admission but there's at least 5 other great songs as well.

Only 5? Cousin, the whole thing is excellent, imo. Except 'The Chain' which is the only slight drawback for me.

 

To be fair I only have spun the Taking Dawn once and there were 5 that stood out as great but there wasn't any that I hated so there are all sure to get better with repeated spins. Plus I was talking to my wife while driving through Montana while playing it so couldn't concentrate 100% on it.

[Dave]

Guitar Pete - Mean Streets......Heard it for the first time and don't need to hear it again before giving my verdict......

 

One serious kick ass down & dirty, in your face heavy blues mutha of an album !!!!!!!!!!!!

[Jez]

Leverage - Circus Colossus

Not as stellar as the previous two discs(with Tides being my fav and one of my favs of the decade) but I've actually played this one a few times and it's growing on me. Fav songs are "Movie Gods", "Wolf and the Moon", "Legions of Invisible" and "Revelation".

 

 

It will grow and grow on you I think . The new one stomps all over the other two from a great height for me.