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Cherry Red [Release date 23.06.23]
What can you say about Robin George that hasn’t already been said?
He seems to have been circling under rock’n’roll’s radar forever, ready to land, but never making that last critical step.
Considering that the material on Ace In My Hand, a 2CD package, was recorded during down time at The Old Smithy Studios in Worcester in the late seventies, the production is impressive.
The sonics have a homemade sound at times, but they are sharp and balanced, and George’s measured arrangements are full of crisp invention, colourful flourishes and an irresistible bounce, showing a technical maturity surprising in an artist so young.
You can hear influences, of course you can – Uriah Heep, Def Leppard, Thin Lizzy and naturally Trapeze, – the artists he mixed with, the great and the good of the times – but the music is not necessarily derivative.
George puts his own stamp on ‘Ace In My Hand’ and ‘Streetwise’, giving them both a glammy glow, jacking up his riffs with the help of muscular bass, drum and keyboard work from “pickup” band, Pete Wright, Terry Rowley, Dave Holland and Pete Goalby.
The album’s almost standouts, ‘Chance Of A Lifetime’ (written with Goalby), ‘Get On Your Knees And Pray’, propelled by George’s trademark taut, whiplash riffs are eminently tuneful and delivered with bite. Archetypal UK melodic rock in the eighties.
But it’s fair to say that the collection pivots on a fulcrum of two key songs.
The evergreen ‘Heartline’ has survived decades of change in musical fashion. Its great riff has never died and in fact it has no plans to fade away.
Over those same years, themes of love, peace and perseverance have become hardwired into George’s lyrics… no better beginning than his ode to the common man, ‘Go Down Fighting’. Clearly for George, this was a personal philosophy.
These songs should have been his passport to better opportunities, better times. But we’ve had this conversation, and we are where we are.
The good news is that this 2 CD package is only the first in a series being curated and readied for release by Cherry Red. It includes many previously unpublished liner notes from the late Malcolm Dome, and pics from George’s own collection.
A sign of things to come. Good on them. ****
Review by Brian McGowan
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