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Upcoming: European, USA & World Tour Dates and Gig Listing (2026)
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Author Archives: brianmc
Album review : GLENN HUGHES / ROBIN GEORGE – Overcome
Cherry Red [Release date : 24.11.23] Label wars resulted in the Glenn Hughes / Robin George 1990 album, Sweet Revenge, being confined to the dustbin of rock’n’roll history. Until now. Resurrected, remastered and retitled by the UK’s leading reissue label, … Continue reading
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Tagged album, Cannock, Cherry Red, funk, Glenn Hughes, Notorious, Overcome, review, Robin George, rock, Sweet Revenge
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Album review : STATUS QUO – Official Archive Series Vol 2
earMUSIC [Release date 24.11.23] World leading experts at mining their own back catalogue, Status Quo stake another claim with SQ Volume 2 (2 CDs/23 tracks). It’s a 2012 gig, recorded live at the O2 Arena, on the “Quo Festive” tour. … Continue reading
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Tagged 2 CDs, Christmas, live, O2 Arena, Quo Festive Tour, review
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Album review : Looking For The Magic (American Power Pop in The Seventies 3CD boxset)
Cherry Red [Release date 17.11.23] American Power Pop In The Seventies found what it was looking for numerous times. Something of a cliché, but you could almost stick a pin in the chronologically curated tracklist of this 3 CD anthology … Continue reading
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Tagged Alex Chilton, Andrew Gold, Badfinger, Carly Simon, Ian LLoyd, Linda Ronstadt, power pop, review, seventies, the Knack, Utopia
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Album review : DGM – Life
Frontiers Music [Release date : 17.11.23] Hugely underrated Italian Prog Metallers, DGM, continue to provide reasons why they should be underrated no longer. On their eleventh album now since the debut in 1997, they’ve seen the inevitable lineup changes that … Continue reading
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Tagged album, DGM, Italian, Marco Basile, Prog Metallers, progrock, review, Simone Mularoni
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Album review : CARE OF NIGHT – Reconnected
Frontiers [Release date : 17.11.23] Third album from rising Swedish AOR/Melodic Rock band, Care Of Night. Vocalist Calle Schonberg, guitarist Ostrom Berg and producer, Erik Wigelius have shifted the band’s sound up several notches. There’s a strong and welcome resemblance … Continue reading
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Tagged album, AOR, Care of Night, Chicago, Erik Wigelius, Johnny Hates Jazz, melodic rock, Peter Cetera, review, Work Of Art
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Album review : SECRET SPHERE – Blackened Heartbeat
Frontiers [Release date 10.11.23] Blackened Heart is the tenth studio album from the EU’s Power Metal poster boys, Secret Sphere. It’s also the second with original vocalist, Roberto Messina, who reunited with the band on 2021’s Lifeblood, after an 8 … Continue reading
Album review : VENOM – Live From The Hammersmith Odeon (CD/DVD Deluxe Digipak)
Cherry Red [Release date : 27.10.23] Formed in England’s industrial North East in 1979, there was none heavier, none more extreme and indeed none more influential in the heavy metal genre than Venom. The band’s reputation was born out of … Continue reading
Album review: BERNIE TORME – Lightning Strikes 1982-83 (4 CD boxset)
Cherry Red [Release date: 27.10.23] Four CD Boxset of some of Irish guitar wunderkind, Bernie Torme’s best stuff, remastered: Turn Out The Lights (1982) Electric Gypsies (1982) Live 1983 Live In Sheffield (1983) When Torme decamped to London, in 1974, … Continue reading
Album review : ROBBY VALENTINE – Embrace The Unknown
Independent [Release date : 21.10.23] Robby Valentine’s new release, Embrace The Unknown, is his 13th studio album. Something of enigma, he’s worked with Kristoffer (Pain of Salvation) Gildenlow, Jeff Scott Soto, and Arjen (Ayreon) Lucassen, to name but three, and … Continue reading
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Tagged album, Big Pharma, Government, Jellyfish, operatic, pandemic, Queen, review, Robbie Valentine, Symphonic Melodic Rock, Vaccine
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Album review : VITALINES – Wheels Within Wheels
Frontiers [Release date: 20.10.23] Vitalines is Tommy Denander and Robbie LaBlanc. Two musicians who need little or no introduction to the Melodic Rock fraternity. You might immediately be intrigued by the song titles. Several catch your eye: ‘Cards From Another … Continue reading
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Tagged Alias, AOR, Chicago, Frontiers, melodic rock, MrMister, review, Robbie LaBlanc, Survivor, Tommy Denander, Toto, Vitalines, Wheels Within Wheels
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Album review : EDGE OF FOREVER – Ritual
Frontiers [Release date : 13.10.23] Alessandro Del Vecchio’s band, Edge Of Forever, have released some interesting albums over the last few years. Native American culture has been a constant theme. It clearly inspired a quartet of tracks on last year’s … Continue reading
Album review : NUCLEAR ASSAULT – Radiation Sickness
Cherry Red/Dissonance [Release date : 13.10.23] Despite multiple break ups over the years, US Thrash Metal band, Nuclear Assault continued touring into the new millennium, only hanging their boots up last year. The band, formed by ex Anthrax bassist, Dan … Continue reading
Album review : NITRATE – Feel The Heat
Frontiers [Release date : 23.09.23] Nitrate’s founding member and bassist, Nick Hogg has again opted for vocalist Alexander Strandell and the Martin (Vega) brothers (who also produce) to round out the band on his latest, (and fourth) album, Feel The … Continue reading
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Tagged Alexander Strandell, AOR, Danger Danger, Glen Frey, Heart, Issa, John Waite, Martin Brothers, New Wave, Nick Hogg, Nitrate, Paul Laine, review, Vega
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Album review : KINGS CROWN – Closer To The Truth
Frontiers [Release date : 13.10.23] Melodic Hard Rock’s European union of British vocalist, Lee (Shy/Sweet) Small and Swedish Guitarist Martin (Gypsy Rose/Phenomena) Kronlund looks like being a huge success. Small’s voice is the kind of thing which prompts awe not … Continue reading
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Tagged album, Anders Skoog, Frontiers, Glenn Hughes, Kings Crown, Lee Small, Martin Kronlund, melodic hard rock, Phenomena, review, Seventies Rock, Shy, Sweet
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Album review: IMPELLITTERI – The Complete Beast 1987-2009 (6 CD Boxset)
Cherry Red [Release date: 06.10.23] Every Impellitteri album from 1988 to 2009. Nine in all, and the band’s 2 EPs. Plus a score of bonus tracks. All shoehorned into 6 jampacked CDs. (Such was the weight of heavy metal contained … Continue reading
Album review: IRON SAVIOR – Firestar
AFM Records [Release date 06.10.23] Iron Savior’s 2020 album, Skycrest, signalled a new era of Power Metal. Three years later, the voyage of the mothership has apparently been sidelined temporarily, to allow a celebration of Teutonic and indeed, in places, … Continue reading
Album review : THE RUNAWAYS – Neon Angels On The Road To Ruin (5 CD boxset)
Cherry Red [Release date : 29.09.23] An all female rock band is rare. A successful all female rock band is even rarer. US band, The Runaways, Cherie Currie, Joan Jett, Lita Ford, Sandy West and Jackie Fox, broke through the … Continue reading
Album review: 38 SPECIAL – Special Forces and Wild Eyed Southern Boys (Remasters)
Rock Candy Records [Release date: 08.09.23] In 2008, a major fire in Universal Studios’ Hollywood Warehouse devastated the company’s music archives. 38 Special were one of the bands to suffer a significant loss…and if nothing else, that gives these remasters … Continue reading
Album review : SHAKE THAT THING ! The Blues In Britain 1963-73
Cherry Red [Release date 22.09.23] Without the blues, there would be no rock’n’roll. That’s the history. This 73 track, 3 CD package is an extensive collection of recordings by British bands and solo artists, all heavily influenced by American Blues. … Continue reading
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Tagged 1963, 1973, Alex Harvey, Alexis Korner, Bert Jansch, blues, boxset, Britain, Christine McVie, Fleetwood Mac, Gene Vincent, Humble Pie, Jethro Tull, John Martyn, John Mayall, John McAuley, Judy Dyble, Leadbelly, Lindsay Buckingham, Long John Baldry, Mungo Jerry, Pete Green, review, Robert Johnson, Rory Gallagher, Savoy Brown, TASTE, Ten Years After, The Animals, The Climax Chicago Blues Band, Trader Horne
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Album review : BONFIRE – MMMXXIII
AFM [Release date : 22.09.23] MMMXXIII is a suite of three albums re-recorded by German Rock giants, Bonfire. The band’s continued popularity and success through the decades confounds critics, of the genre at least, if not the band. That of … Continue reading
Album review : RONNIE ROMERO – Too Many Lies Too Many Masters
Frontiers [release date : 15.09.23] Ronnie Romero’s third “solo” album is delivered by a pretty cool hard rock trio rounded out by guitarist Jose Rubio and drummer, Andy C. The label make a point of telling us that this is … Continue reading
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Tagged album, Andy C, Delta blues, hard rock, Jose Rubio, review, Ronnie Romero
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Album review : SEVENTH WONDER – Become, Waiting In The Wings, Mercy Falls, Great Escape
Frontiers [Release date : 15.09.23] Unsurprisingly, after the commercial and critical success of Seventh Wonder’s most recent album, The Testament, released May 2022, the band’s previous, much lower profile albums have been given a new lease of life. Frontiers Music … Continue reading
Album review : JACK STARR’S BURNING STARR – Metal Generation 1985-2017
Cherry Red [release date 08/09/23] It seems like Jack Starr’s bands have been playing gigs and cranking out albums ever since Heavy Metal became a thing. And yet, from his beginnings with Virgin Steele in 1982, to his primary music … Continue reading
Album review: DBA – Celestial Songs
Cherry Red Records [Release date : 08.09.23] Right from the Downes Braide Association’s (DBA) first album (this is their fifth), the duo sounded like they’d been round the block a few times. Like they’d done things we couldn’t, seen things … Continue reading
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Album review : DEACON BLUE – All The Old 45s, The Very Best Of Deacon Blue
Cooking Vinyl [Release date : 01.09.23] 1987, and the critics said they wouldn’t last, and here we are, 36 years later, and Deacon Blue are releasing… wait for it… a 41 track, double CD album titled All The Old 45s … Continue reading
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Tagged 2CDs, album, blues, Dougie Vipond, Glasgow, Hits, James Prime, Lorraine McIntosh, pop, review, Ricky Ross, rock
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