Reviews

The new album »Don't Let Up« is fresh proof that the creative juices in the camp of long-living west coast/AOR legends Night Ranger are nowhere near running dry

»Blazon Stone« is rightly one of the most revered classic Running Wild albums, packing some of the most unforgettable moments in the history of this cult band.

In the DVD and CD package, the DVD is the one that matters. Listen to just the CD and you'll get the impression this thing is way too polished.

»Tequila Suicide« will first and foremost please the band's diehard fans, the ones who've been breathing with them since their early days. A very solid, nice, classic Sinner album.

What's behind the somewhat longer gaps between albums that we've gotten used to from this band over the last thirteen years doesn't even matter, because »Six« delivers exactly what fans have been waiting for.

"2068" is first and foremost a very cautious album. It's chasing airplay. But we've heard all of this in Slovenia before. Countless times, and a long time ago.

Rok and Nina have managed to breathe new life into traditional folk melodies, whose main tunes practically echo through our beings every day, giving them a new face, a new musical nature, and a new way of stirring emotion and passion.

This is an album where you absolutely have to switch off your rational brain. Only then will it grab you full-bloodedly and carry you off into the wild, untamed expanses of a unique musical language, created by Brgs and Nac in an equally…

Most Jethro Tull fans will be asking themselves the same thing this time: Ian, did we really need this album? There's no real reason for its release other than the ever-sarcastic, cheeky master of flute artistry and clever concept stunts…

An album of easygoing, short-but-punchy strokes and compositional solutions. Seasoned with plenty of melody that runs through every single track, making it instantly memorable and infectiously singable.

The comeback of the written-off!

The old-school Whitesnake recipe keeps on levitating!

"Divje jezero play with the passion of unbridled emotion and a sparkling, wholehearted devotion to the musical magic their hearts beat for. And with their second album, the excellent »Pobeg iz blodnjaka«, Divje jezero stay firmly in the…

You could say that on »Pobeg iz blodnjaka« Divje jezero have defined their artistic musical vocabulary even more sharply, and the result is an album of strict jazz-rock fusion revivalism.

»Panta Rei« is, all things considered, a powerfully confessional singer-songwriter album. Taša wrote everything herself: the music, the arrangements, the vocal melodies and the lyrics. She has made a superb record, and she has every right…

A highly intellectual piece of work, in every respect. The music and the poetry are broadly reconciled and play out within a dialogue of overall fulfillment. Recommended for everyone, but those who go for healthy black humor and love…

»The Seraphic Live Works« is an excellent live album and the first real official live document since »Spirit of Live« came out in 2000. Shame it didn't get released in full, the way it was played. On two CDs.

Captain Brock and his Hawkwind spaceship crew have touched down in the middle of an evergreen forest this time, where they hung out with wood nymphs and gorged themselves on magic mushrooms. »Into the Woods« is clear proof that even after…

A vocally distinctive, teasingly seductive, utterly charming record. It's carefully »wrapped up in its arrangements. As such, it couldn't introduce Lamai's first steps into the world of the solo artist any more beautifully or authentically,…

Rhino Bucket aren't straying from the plan. They stay inside the tried-and-tested musical recipe they know better than anyone. Why would they try anything else? No need. If you love the music of the legendary AC/DC, you'll be checking out…

»Pozabljena ljudstva« is a new album of pure eclectic bliss. The engine behind it is a superb symbiosis of an otherwise unusual combo of four instruments: tuba, accordion, harp and percussion!

»Destinations« is the band's next step up. Measured with maturity. The product of homegrown evolution. It delivers a new chapter in the band's musical individuality, one that couldn't care less about genre boundaries and follows…

Even though Trdoživi, in all their modesty, probably wouldn't dare admit it outright at this stage of their career, the album »Poreklo« hits and penetrates exactly like that: fast, rough, wrecking-ball raw, without a shred of obedience!

The band, which formed in the Netherlands years ago and is represented by Slovenian pianist Rok Zalokar, singer Eva Poženel and Dutch drummer Sun Mi Hong, is a fresh source of musical strangeness and tantalizing quirks.

Label: High Roller RecordsRelease date: 28.04.2017Production: Cloven HoofAlbum length: 44.43 minGenre: Heavy Metal (N.W.O.B.H.M.)Rating: 9.0 / 10 These days Cloven Hoof are considered heavy metal legends. They emerged during the…

One of the songs on the new Harem Scarem album is called "Indestructible", and that's exactly how the artistry of this respected, long-running Canadian AOR outfit comes across on "United", their fourteenth studio album overall.

Wear My Skin is no easy listen, mainly because of the bleakness of the thread of loss running through the album, which is also superbly translated into musical form.

What the ambitious, bold "Demo" EP hinted at three years ago, the studio debut "Brutalizer" confirms. On their first full-length, the guys have honed, deepened and defined their revivalist, retro-sounding approach to songwriting even…

The live sound and, at times, the performance on "Classic Live" are only conditionally acceptable for a release sold under the "official bootleg" label.

Lee Payne and his crew have delivered an excellent new studio achievement, backed with full credibility by the name of a legendary representative of the movement known as N.W.O.B.H.M.

»Grimspound« is a worthy successor to the masterpiece that was »Folklore« in every way, and an album prog fans will be arguing about for a long time in 2017. You can feel on every single track that the musicians poured their heart and soul…

Periphery's fourth album, written in just four months, is a remarkable achievement. It has its flaws, since not every track convinces. Still, the band is definitely trying something new while holding on to its original principles.

So dive back into the inner world of women, and feel the intuitive storytelling, the boundless depth and all the piercing force of the black-erotic theater of the duo All Strings Detached.

"With their new album, All Strings Detached stay firmly in the saddle of authorial, creative artistry, a space they handle with serious skill and where they feel most at home."

»Novum« is the best gift Procol Harum could have given their devoted fans to celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of the legendary band.

Label: ZKP RTV SlovenijaRelease date: July 1, 2016Production: Igor MatkovičGenre: JazzRating: 10/10 Composer, producer, pianist, but first and foremost the established Slovenian jazz trumpeter Igor Matkovič is back with a new album,…

»The Source« is a textbook Ayreon rock opera, built on the tried-and-tested 'space' recipe and handled by Arjen and his star-studded guests. Longtime fans will love it, even though it offers nothing particularly fresh compared to what…

You can feel on the album that this quintet could reach for an even bigger dose of experimentation, one that might lead toward avant-garde and jazz-fusion territory. Let's hope they stick together for another record or two.

"»Križanke – Live« is a gorgeous document in every respect, and a must-have souvenir for everyone who was at this concert, which was historic for the band in many ways."

Packed with fresh ideas, endlessly effective dynamism and kinetic energy, »Čas disket je pozabljen« is the band's next step as songwriters, delivering an artistic upgrade on their remarkably bold studio debut.

"Križanke – Live" is a gorgeous document in every respect, packed mostly with the band's new material. It's also a must-have souvenir for everyone who was at this concert, which in many ways was a historic one for the band.

The rhetoric of the album »#aveš« is such that it should win over the Slovenian music public, including by reawakening the memories of all those nostalgic fans who know the band well from before, because the new material will surely fit…

"Ep" is a bold step into the world of Pyroxene's music, which sounds unlike anything that has shown up in the Slovenian heavy metal sky so far, so it's a record worth trying and devouring for every metal fan.

»Toto, I've got a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore,« said Panikk after landing in a gloomy dystopian world ruled with an iron fist by a totalitarian leader, crooked politicians, evil corporations and rotten capitalism.

The original mix of the concept doo-wop burlesque "Cruising with Ruben & the Jets" is still one of the most interesting albums from Frank's early period, even if artistically it doesn't reach the adventurous, provocative masterpieces…

»Let Me Fly« is an awfully predictable effort aimed squarely at the most devoted fans of Mike Rutherford and his The Mechanics, while even those who dig Mike's pop-era adventures with Genesis will probably nod off from boredom pretty…

With »The Night Siren«, Mr. Hackett has once again proven that, compared to the rest of the (ex-)Genesis crew, he's easily the most creative and witty musician around today. He's stayed proud of his musical roots, and he's diligently…

Label: Ear Music RecordsRelease date: 2017Production: Bob EzrinAlbum length: 45.47 minGenre: Heavy Rock/Hard RockRating: 8.0/10 After a four-year break from the studio, Deep Purple are back with "Infinite", their twentieth studio…

The hard rock champions will celebrate their fiftieth anniversary in 2018, and you can bet they'll mark it in a special way. If »Infinite« turns out to be their final studio album, they'll certainly be going out in grand style, because…

If all you want from thrash is speed and brutality, Cloaks of Oblivion might not fully satisfy you, but if you're after "thinking man's thrash", you'll be spinning this new album very, very often.

The fear that Adams went totally sour after his fling with Taylor Swift's music is unfounded, and "Prisoner" takes him back to the confessional ground of his recent albums, the place where he landed with, say, "Ryan Adams" (2014) and,…

»Conformicide« is an incredibly convincing album in filigree packaging: razor-sharp, piercing thrash metal revivalism. With it, Havok confirm their maturing as songwriters and live up to the sky-high praise they got for their previous…

The band picked the best of the best, headed into the studio and re-recorded a selection of tracks from its so-called classic catalog, live-in-the-room style. This time with the new incarnation of the lineup.

"Kozmonavt" is a gorgeous, fully realized confessional statement from Sergej Čas, former vocalist of Desert Fox.

This soft, mellow pastel coloring of the sonic landscape actually delivers the sonic and stylistic shift Bush were after, but the question is whether the band will win over a new generation of listeners.

Wanderer, Heaven Shall Burn's eighth studio album, is a solid continuation of its predecessor. At times the band sounds short on inspiration, and with the heavier focus on melody it's obvious they want to widen their fan base, but that…

Sweet obsession clearly just keeps going and going!

»My Escape« is also an album that's a rarity on Slovenian soil these days, so amid all the hype around extreme metal, its classic metal foundations make it that much more of a pleasant surprise.

Farewell John Wetton, farewell Asia. It was a bold and unforgettable journey.

Expect the unexpected!

Right from the opening bars of Going Backwards, it hits you that listening to the new Depeche Mode album is going to be quite a challenge. What was missing on »Delta Machine« is what »Spriit« brings. And on top of its newly found…

Prav ta »nenormalnost« vokalne karizme Petra Lovšina ostaja tudi na novem albumu njegov zmagoviti poker asov in zagotovilo, da učinkujejo nove ideje, ne glede na žanrsko formatiranje skladb, samosvoje, prepoznavno in edinstveno.…

With The Serenity of Suffering, Korn live up to expectations to a degree, but there's nothing that really blows you away. The album is instrumentally strong, with plenty of punch and darkness, but as a whole it doesn't quite convince — only…

What »Restart« hinted at, »Nekaj več« carries forward at full swing. It's the first proper full-length studio album since Bor Zuljan rejoined the lineup and the band reactivated in 2014. And they've nailed it.

With their self-titled album, Striker prove they're one of the most exciting new-wave heavy metal bands around!

The cult debut from American heavy metal outfit Omen gets a reissue!

An hour of primal thrash metal eruption from a band that, given its legacy and years in the game, nobody would have held it against even slightly if it had suffered from inconsistency and a lack of ideas on its new albums (right, "Big…

Singer Elin's vocal gold and feisty, charismatic punch are as untarnished as ever on the new album, but compared to their debut, Blues Pills have this time served up a somewhat different musical dish.

"Now let's take it easy, man."

Superbly seasoned, rich in ideas and sharply defined in its songwriting, the new album delivers all the right trademarks of that expressive, in-your-face punch from the musical recipe of the one and only Thunder.

Not just a fully worthy successor to »Armaggedonize«, but a notch more mature in artistic songwriting terms and hitting even harder in musical invasiveness, putting it right up there with »Bleed And Scream« (2012).

I can say that House Of Lords haven't delivered an album with such a strong retro, nostalgic AOR pulse in a long time with »Harlequin«.

»Tales from the Twilight World« catapulted Blind Guardian into the ranks of the most thrilling and intelligent acts in Teutonic power metal. By this point in their career it was already clear the foursome had found a very specific style…

»Endure And Survive« is an even better album than the first part of the former Iron Maiden singer's sci-fi concept trilogy "Infinte Entanglement".

Elbow have hit a new maturity milestone in their artistic evolution, and »Little Fictions« is, in a word, a gorgeous new achievement and an artistic gem from a band that will most certainly »stick« in your CD player for a long time to come.

»The 5th« is basically a perfectly decent album, but you shouldn't listen to it through the eyes of a purist who's looking only for the raw, sneering spirit of Teutonic thrash metal aggression. Those guys will be dancing again, this time to…

With the new album, San Di Ego edge even closer to the Šank Rock phenomenon. Comparisons make sense with the essence of the latest Requiem album »Fallen Angel«, with moments from the »K-Metal« album by the Zabukowski project, and it even…

Suicide Silence's self-titled album has its bright spots, but with that opening »Tee Hee« chorus, recycled watered-down ideas and needlessly stretched-out arrangements, those bright spots are invisible. No wonder it's been dubbed the St.…

In these new times, Unruly Child couldn't care less about trends and follow their own musical vision, which has produced a gorgeous new art rock album, proof that the band is nowhere near saying their last word creatively.

This review arrives a touch late, but I'm declaring it a tribute to the late keyboardist of this legendary Birmingham NWOBHM band, Geoff Nicholls, who passed away at the end of January 2017.

This is Axxis sounding closer again to the careers of their commercially successful days, and if »Kingdom Of the Night II« was the sequel to the cult debut, »Retrolution« is the evolutionarily logical successor to…

A new theater of merciless dragon slaying is upon us.

Tokyo Motor Fist is an album every fan of Trixter, Danger Danger, the Danger Danger members' side projects and solo records, and last but not least old-school Def Leppard, early Bon Jovi and the ever-reliable Gotthard simply has to check…

Let's enjoy the sweet illusion a little longer that we're listening to Thin Lizzy in 2017, even though what we've got is Black Star Riders.

The story doesn't change much. Not in style or production, anyway. It's hard rock heavily inspired by 80s AOR, this time with a whole pack of guest guitarists.

A solid, fun stopgap on the way to a new studio album.

Even if you already have "Turbo" at home, and even if you're not exactly a die-hard fan, the "Turbo 30" edition is worth picking up. If only for the previously unreleased concert on the two bonus CDs.

Jernej Zoran remains "V svojem filmu". In Slovenia, it's a lone and singular manifesto of rock audacity, sustaining the high creativity and songwriting insight of this superb guitarist and composer from Lower Carniola.

"After Drevored's album "Na zahod," Jernej Zoran's new album is another exceptionally strong original achievement on the Slovenian rock'n'roll front, and both came out at the very dawn of 2017."

Poetry recitals by Žarko Jovanovski, pulled from his rich body of work and colored, in the glow of an unexpected "junk" guitar turn, by the imaginative musical world of Andrej Boštjančič Ruda's spontaneous inspiration.

Label: Sony MusicRelease date: February 3, 2017Produced by: Tom AllomAlbum length: 40.58 minBonus live (2CD) album length: 101.45 minGenre: Heavy MetalRating: 9.5/10 At the end of last year, thirty years after its original release,…

Pride Of Lions' latest top-quality release is a textbook case of compositional perfectionism, the kind you can only really pull off in the (these days archaic) AOR genre. Provided, of course, that you're the one and only Jim Peterik.

Back in 2011, after shaking off his health problems, former Great White vocalist Jack Russell laid the groundwork for a new band. Now its debut is here. Take it with a big grain of salt.

On »Follow the Blind«, Blind Guardian wade into harder, darker waters, and the album practically bursts with rebellious energy. They also start slowly experimenting with keyboards, kicking off the next stage of their sonic evolution.

"Lykaia" digs deeper into what makes Soen tick! Is the new album packed with polished melodies, ambitiously loosened up with experimental exploration and progressive, technically complex musical figures?

"»Lykaia« is yet another gorgeous album, full of polished melodies that are ambitiously, experimentally loosened up with the exploratory value of progressively and technically complex musical figures. "

Album length: 38:33 Production: Maras Tomaž Mot & Mike Poole Release date: 2017 Label: Nika Records Click to buyRating: 9.0/10 Drevored are a rock band from the Dolenjska region, based in Novo mesto. Seven years after their…

For all the qualities of this record, this reviewer can't get over how Dušan Prosinečki's finely honed, soulful "songwriter" talent is still such a well-kept musical secret in Slovenia.

The ambitious debut from one of the finest bands on the German metal scene, "Battalions of Fear" was still very much a speed metal record that wore the influence of some more established metal acts on its sleeve. But on a few tracks you…

Steven Wilson is more invested in the project again, and that brings the new album's compositions back toward musical elements you can compare, in style and sound, mostly to the later work of Procupine Tree and, of course, Wilson's solo…