Frontiers Records

I have a vague memory of Kix’s first release, be it alone for those vivid green letters the band name was – and still is – written in.  Musically I don’t remember very much, except one song ‘Atomic Bomb’, I guess at that time there were other bans around I was more interested in.  and that’s about it, neither me or my friends bought other records by this band.

So it was with a bit of a surprise to learn this band still existed. It seems they have even been writing new stuff for a new album that should be released somewhere in 2013.

I hadn’t realized Royal Hunt already exist 20 years.  Time flies by.  To celebrate their 20 years of existence, Royal Hunt have released a Special edition set, which contains no less than 3 CD’s, and one DVD.  On it is an anthology of songs coming from their 11 albums, but also one brand new song, and three acoustic songs.  The DVD features all promotional clips shot by the band over these 20 years.

The band’s name attracted my curiosity, since back in 1993 there was a band with the same name that released a reasonably good album ‘Smoke And Mirrors’.  But when I put the CD on, I was brought back to reality, this Snakecharmer sounded totally different from the 90ies Snake Charmer. 

If you’re into glam metal, than this is just your thing I guess.  Gene The Werewolf – who persuaded these guys into this name? – play no-nonsense, eighties glam rock. From the instance I put this album on, my foot was tapping along with the songs.  It’s all so catchy, and of course we’ve all heard it before, but it’s so damn good…

They’ve put in just the right amount of guitars, drums, keyboard, you name it, they’ve got it.  Don’t expect farfetched lyrics, these guys sing about women, love, partying.  No hard sought lyrics, but just straight rock’n’roll lyrics.

No my dear friends, this is not a new Survivor album you could be listening to, but it’s once again a gem, chock full of very nice tunes by Pride Of Lions.  As a matter of fact this is already their fourth studio album since their first release in 2003. You cannot ignore the tell-tale voice of Jim Peterik of course, but Toby Hitchcock also sings a mean tune if you ask me.

Soleil Moon Is only a duo, formed by singer Larry King (current singer in the Michael Thompson Band) and keyboardist John Blasucci (current keyboarder with Dennis DeYoung (ex Styx)).   Of course for this record they were assisted by other talented musicians like Leland Sklar, Michael Thompson and others.

While I had been pleasantly surprised by the first two Issa albums, this new album was short of a deception to me.  Despite the fact that she has chosen songs from some well known melodic/AOR/hard rock artists like Mark Free, Aviator, 21 Guns, Atlantic and other bands, and has reworked them, it is a rather weak album.

I was one of the lucky when I was able to attend Y&T’s concert at the Biebob last year, where they played the complete Earthshaker record, in celebration of its thirtieth release.  I also remember to this day when that record was released.  It’s one of those records that, although dating from my youth, still regularly is played, and seems to have lost nothing of its freshness.

Upon hearing the first notes of this album, it was immediately clear that this was not an US band.  In fact these guys come form Belfast,  Northern Ireland.  This is actually their second album, and if their first was similar to this one, it must have been a good album.

This album is an album that might make some of you starting to feel a bit nostalgic about decennia that have long since passed.  With this I mean that this album seems to have its roots back in the eighties.  Just listen to the fourth song ‘Batllegrounds’, and I guess that anyone who was musically aware in the eighties, will immediately say that this song was inspired by ‘Over The Hills And Far Away’ by the late Gary Moore.