Band: Covered Call
Album title: Money Never Sleeps
Label: Blistering Records
Distributor: Bertus
Release date: 25/03/2009
Release: CD

The foundations for this Swedish Modern Hard Rock act were laid down in 2006 when four accomplished musicians decided to have a go at it, drawn together by their combined playing experience and the mutual love for good ‘ole Rock music!

Actually, the instigator of it all was drummer Ronny Svanströmer, who decided to reconnect with his old jamming buddy, guitarist Ola Johansson (made his debut with popular Melodic Hard Rock act Spearfish, appears on their acclaimed debut album Different Access). The line-up was temporarily completed when the twosome were joined by guitarist Joel Carlsson and singer/ bassist Johan Palmberg (both musicians with extensive experiences on the thriving home country’s scene). With Ronny bringing in the ideas for the basic riffs, Joel and Johan bringing in the melodic melodies, and the whole being arranged in collaboration with Ola, the four were soon writing and rehearsing their own songs, drawing influences from such diverse artists as AC/DC, Bon Jovi, Kiss, Thin Lizzy, UFO, and Van Halen. The music flowed together pretty quickly, as did the chemistry between the members, and the foursome decided their material waranted being recorded. They put together a makeshift “studio” in a shed, and recorded 10 songs defining their sound, “…thoughtful lyrics combined with edgy guitars, rasping Rock vocals and a monstrous rhythm section…”!

A short moment after the initial recording sessions, Johan decided to take a break from the band, and Thomas Thulin took over bass duties. During their search for a new singer to complete the line-up, Covered Call was lucky enough to come across Thomas Vikström (Talk Of The Town, Candlemass, Therion, etc…), whom was happy enough to join the band aand put his unique vocal mark on the music. In Spring 2008 the band’s demo recordings were put under the attention of international Rock and Metal label Blistering Records, who were suitably impressed to give the band a full backing. Thus, in a production by Ronny and Joel, and recording & mixing done by Fredrik Nordström & Henrik Udd, the band was eventually sent off to Studio Fredman, where the guys recorded the 10 tracks that make up their debut full-length. I’m not sure whether that happened before, or after Ola was replaced by new second guitarist Morgan Rosenquist in the Autumn of last year.
If you’ve been wondering where Covered Call gets its somewhat awkward bandname from, know that several of the founding members are active in the banking world, and a “covered call” is a term in that world whereby “…investors have a long-term position in an asset combined with a short-term position in a call option on the same underlying asset…” (if you undersstood that, I recommend you go into banking yourself…to me the whole things sounds somewhat fraudulous, but then I don’t know anything about high finance banking).

As the bio sheet mentions, Covered Call’s music “…is an eclectic mix of driving, Melodic Hard Rock steeped in the classic vibe of bands like Bon Jovi, Van Halen, Thin Lizzy and Kiss, but…,” definitively, “…with a thoroughly modern, European slant!”. Most of all though, the band has a face of it’s own, playing Melodic Hard Rock with enough groove and melody to keep the listener wanting to hear the album out, with the necessary harmonic vocal backings for one to feel enticed into singing along with the tunes after only a couple of listening sessions! Check it out for yourself by surfing to myspace.com/coveredcall, where you’ll find proof in the 6 songs posted that these guys can Rock out in a most pleasing melodic way! But there’s a more sensitive side to the guys as well, you know, coming in the form of the very nice acoustic ballad “Anything You Want”, where Vikström and his vocal backup is accompanied only by a piano tune…with not even a guitar solo in sight! Very different from the rest of the stuff, for sure, and nót on the MySpace player, I’m afraid!!!

87/100

Tony.