Rock Candy Records [Release date 17.12.21]
1985, and the first of Joe Lynn Turner’s ten solo albums over the last 20 years, Rescue You, is released to huge acclaim.
He’s clearly decided to distance himself from the rock/metal approach of his band of the previous 5 years, Rainbow.
In fact a visiting alien who’s been brought up on a strict diet of Foreigner albums might be forgiven for thinking he (or indeed she) is listening to Lou Gramm here.
Opener ‘Losing You’ has that same confident timbre, a voice weighted with emotion, but not weighed down. Like Gramm, Turner possesses the same soaring, soulful delivery. And indeed, the song itself has that same pulsing urgency that reinforced many of Foreigner’s best tracks.
And funnily enough, all the songs on Rescue You are co-writes between Turner and one of Foreigner’s founding members, Al Greenwood, who played keyboards on the first 3 albums.
The title track, ‘Rescue You’ is in a similar vein to the opener. It summons up just enough melody to match Turner’s vocal intensity, on a quality song tuned to FM Radio. Greenwoods keyboards can be intrusive at times, but here they get the balance right.
‘Young Hearts’ and ‘Endlessly’ go off, if not tangentially, but at an acute angle into AOR territory. It’s Greenwood’s keyboards that do the heavy lifting, sending Turner’s voice skimming across the surface of these elegantly crafted romantic ditties. The latter was clearly aimed at radio, and to an extent it hit the target, rebounding off the Billboard Top 100 a few times, before falling back to earth.
Of the rest, only the rocky ‘On The Run’ measure up, mainly thanks to Bobby Messano’s skillfully turned axework, and Chuck Burgi’s thundering percussive thump, both pushing the music in the right direction. ‘Soul Searcher’ nearly gets there but is undone by the overuse of samples and programmed beats.
At times you can’t escape the feeling that it’s all a bit underdone, that what could have been so special needed a beefier production, but ultimately it suffers from a lack of enough truly memorable melodies. ***
Review by Brian McGowan
Featured Artist: JOSH TAERK
Since early 2020 Josh has been entertaining us with exclusive monthly live sessions, streamed via Facebook.
Next session: Sunday 19 January
Check out videos here: https://www.facebook.com/getreadytorockradio
David Randall presents a weekly show on Get Ready to ROCK! Radio, Sundays at 22:00 GMT, repeated on Mondays and Fridays), when he invites listeners to ‘Assume The Position’. The show signposts forthcoming gigs and tours and latest additions at getreadytorock.com. First broadcast on 1 December 2024.
UK Blues Broadcaster of the Year (2020 and 2021 Finalist) Pete Feenstra presents his weekly Rock & Blues Show on Tuesday at 19:00 GMT as part of a five hour blues rock marathon “Tuesday is Bluesday at GRTR!”. The show is repeated on Wednesdays at 22:00, Fridays at 20:00). This show was first broadcast 3 December 2024.
How to Listen Live?
Click the programming image at the top of the page (top right of page if using desktop)
Listen via Windows Media Player. Click or tap here and “open file”
Listen via other media player (eg. VLC) Click or tap here and “open file”
Get Ready to ROCK! Radio is also in iTunes under Internet Radio/Classic Rock
Listen in via the Tunein app and search for “Get Ready to ROCK!” and save as favourite.
More information and links at our radio website where you can listen again to shows via the presenter pages: getreadytorockradio.com
Power Plays w/c 9 December 2024
In this sequence we play ‘The Best of 2024′ GRTR! reviewer selections
Featured Albums w/c 9 December 2024
09:00-12:00 The Best of 2024 (Melodic Rock)
12:00-13:00 The Best of 2003-2024 (Melodic Hard Rock)
14:00-16:00 The Best of 2024 (Singer Songwriter)
PDF - you can delete unwanted sections
