Album review: TURKISH DELIGHT – Volume 1

Escape Music [Release date 21.10.22]

Turkish Delight celebrates the joy that Escape Music co-owner Khalil Turk has for the kind of music he loves so much, namely AOR and melodic rock. This selection was personally chosen by Khalil, with material from the likes of Steve Overland (FM), Chris Ousey (Heartland), Steve Morris (Ian Gillan/Heartland), Steve Newman and Tommy Denander.

Musician wise guests appearing include Ronnie Platt (Kansas), Billy Greer (Streets/Kansas), Billy Sheehan, Gary Pihl (Sammy Hagar/Boston/Alliance), Jeff Pilson (Dokken), Jeff Scott Soto, Mike Slamer, Joel Hoekstra (Whitesnake), Mark Mangold, Mark Stanway, Mat Sinner, Marco Mendoza, Ricky Phillips (Styx), Robin Beck, Robin Mc Auley, James Christian (House Of Lords) and the aforementioned Steve Overland.

‘Live Again’ features Kansas vocalist Ronnie Platt and has a whiff of that band’s 80s sound. This is followed by ‘Crazy Days’ with Jerome Maza at the mic, a singer who sounds uncannily like former Kansas vocalist Styeve Walsh. No surprise then that the song’s sound has a nice bit of 70s Kansas pomp about it.

For a bit of straight ahead hard rock the Billy Greer fronted ‘Bad Enough’ and Jeff Scott Soto on ‘Harder They Fall’ (tasty bit of Hammond playing on this courtesy of Alessandro Del Vecchi) will do nicely.

Liking the Terry Brock performance on ‘Get Out Of Here’, shades of Strangeways and about time we had some new music from him. Lee Small takes things down a bluesier road on ‘Hangman’s Blues’, complete with a Joel Hoekstra guitar solo. Tony Harnell fits the AOR-tastic ‘Take It Away’ perfectly, a song written by Michael Landau joining Steve Overland and Tommy Denander, both of whom feature on the song.

‘Belly Of The Beast’ is the ballad moment, made a little more pomp by Mark Mangold’s keyboards flourishes. Chris Ousey gives an impassioned vocal performance too. ‘Sweet Serenity’ obviously sounds like House Of Lords given that James Christian is singing, with Robin Beck on backing vocals. Possibly the weakest song on offer but still better than many melodic rock songs released this year.

Despite the number of writers and musicians involved the whole album holds together well, helped as the theme running through the album is to create enjoyable and top quality melodic rock.

Turkish Delight indeed! Dip into this box of musical delights (for vinyl lovers this is available as a limited edtion double LP and there are two songs exclusive to this version) if you have any love of highly polished AOR and melodic rock tunes. ***1/2

Review by Jason Ritchie

Featured Artist: JOSH TAERK

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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)