Album review: THE V – Now Or Never

THE V – Now Or Never

Frontiers Records [Release date 03.07.15]

Who is ‘The V’ then? Why it’s non-other than Benedictum screamer Veronica Freeman and ‘Now Or Never’ is her debut solo album where she ventures away from her traditional style of lead vocals.

Helping Veronica out musically we have a varied cast of hard rock icons such as Michael Sweet (Stryper), Jeff Pilson (Dokken), Jerry Dixon (Warrant) and Mike Lepond (Symphony X), her Benedictum band mates plus other lesser knowns…

‘Now Or Never’ shows that The V can wrap her tonsils around a wide variety of hard rock tunes but my main problem lies with the lack of depth on the song writing front.

Opener Again starts things off with some impressive vocals and heavy riffs…plus dodgy lyrics (“you threw me from the cliff…”). Title track Now Or Never is a fairly harmless old school rocker but apart from the Leather Leone co-vocal on the catchy Kiss My Lips there is a definite lull in the middle of this…none of the songs being memorable in the slightest. Rollercoaster, Line In The Sand, Spellbound, Starshine, Below Zero all just pass by in a haze.

Things improve at the end with Ready To Run and King For a Day featuring the highly underrated Tony Martin…but even this seems to end rather abruptly before it really got going…

Disappointing as this could have been so much better…  **½

Review by Phil Berisford


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Power Plays w/c 18 March 2024

GYPSY’S KISS We’ve Come To Play
FM Out Of The Blue (Frontiers)
SHOTGUN MISTRESS Shot Down (indie)
ATTIC THEORY Violent Delight (indie)
FLOYA Yume (FiXT)
SAHAJI Tell Me All Your Feelings (indie)

Featured Albums w/c 18 March 2024

09:00-12:00 The Best of 2003-2023
12:00-13:00 LEAVES’ EYES Myths Of Fate (AFM Records)
14:00-16:00 HOLLY LERSKI Sweet Decline (indie)


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