Band : King Kobra
Album title : King Kobra
Label : Frontiers Records
Distributor : Rough Trade Benelux.
Release Date : 15/04/2011
Release : CD

King Kobra was formed in 1984 by legendary drummer Carmine Appice (Ozzy Osbourne, Rod Stewart, Vanilla fudge) in Los Angeles.  The band featured four at that time relatively unknown musicians.  David-Michael Philips on guitar, who later joined Lizzy Borden.  Also on guitar Mick Sweda, who later on was found back in The Bulletboys.  Johnny Rod handled the bass guiter and later went to W.A.S.P., and finally Mark Free, now Marcie Free, who had his fame and fortune with Unruly Child.

King Kobrareleased two rather succesfull albums, 1985 release ‘Ready to Strike’ and 1986’s ‘Thrill of a Lifetime’, both on Capitol Records.  After that Carmine Appice dissolved the band and joined John Sykes on his Blue Murder project.

In  2010 the original line-up of the band, minus Mark Free reunited.  As replacement vocalist they turned towards PaulShortino, also an eighties veteran, and known from bands like Quiet Riot and Rough Cutt.
I found that Paul Shortino never got the rewards he deserved, as he’s a very good vocalist.  So it was with great pleasure that I played this CD.  On top of that the songs themselves are quite good, mostly up-tempo songs. As a matter of fact, this album could easily have been released by Rough Cutt, as stylewise it’s very similar to them.  Of course drumwork by Mr.Appice is at it’s peak.  The cherry on the pie is the excellent guitar work. Had this album been released in the eighties, it could easily have been a great success.  What fate it will fare in this era, that’s entirely another question.

94/100

Erik Morren.