Reviews

"This live document loudly announces that 2020 will once again be one of the more exciting years for Blue Öyster Cult and all their devoted fans, in an already colorful and long-lived career for these iconic rock heavyweights."

"The third reissue of a string of cult classics, first released as "Cult Classic" in 1994, has gotten a sound remaster, and it signals that after 19 dry years Blue Öyster Cult are getting ready to release a new studio album."

"The memory of 'The Five Man Acoustical Jam' lives on. Carried 30 years forward, it finds a mature reaffirmation in the band's new collection of acoustically arranged goodies, 'Five Man London Jam (Live at Abbey Road)'."

Older fans won't be interested in this album in the slightest. But then, In Flames aren't a young band anymore that has to pay the bills by playing small halls. Despite all the criticism, In Flames somehow hung on. It more than obviously…

"»Mi nismo« is, as said, the best El Kachon album released to date. A sextet of outstanding musical characters, delivering an extraordinary blend of full-blooded emotion, passion, brilliant creative freshness and eclecticism that's rooted…

Pattern-Seeking Animals are a band you'll definitely be hearing a lot more about among prog rock fans in the coming years. Their debut will naturally delight all the Spock's Beard fans out there, who, while waiting for the new album from…

»From This Place« is a real treat for fans of refined, old-school jazz fusion dressed up with superb orchestral touches, and a wonderful experience for anyone who worships Metheny's guitar artistry.

After more than two decades, the most revered album in the story of Lucassen's ever-ambitious Ayreon project has finally got a live version, and it's remarkably faithful to the studio original. That's news that's bound to delight most fans…

With Quadra, Sepultura have proven once again that they're far from done. Quadra surprises with its punch, its variety and even its pomp. Definitely another album that will win Sepultura plenty of new fans.

"The album "Sign of the Times" comes with a different production and a distinctly sharpened-up sound, but otherwise hits every high-quality standard of the top-shelf hard rock that stands behind the name Axel Rudi Pell."

"'Shapeshifting' is an album where Satriani managed to deliver exactly what he set out to. A set of thirteen tracks with wildly different characters that paint a vivid picture of his guitar playing's personality, or rather its musical…

"The new Nightwish album is a hugely ambitious piece of work, and it cements the shift in style and sound already noticeable on the band's last two records. As such, it's going to split their fanbase even further."

" The solo debut from Nightwish bassist Marko Hietala is, loosely speaking, an art rock album! It can even (conditionally) carry the prog label, and as some might wrongly expect, it's nowhere near a metal record. It's an outstanding…

We Blame The Empire's second album is going to thrill fans of modern metalcore above all. The record boasts a good dose of punch, melody, emotion and electronic touches.

"Teaming up with Josh Evans in search of new artistic challenges paid off for Pearl Jam. With a refreshed sound, the band tried out a bunch of new ideas, especially working in sonic structures they'd never used before, and "grew up"."

"Still, artistically Blaze has been a little robbed of freshness lately. So this album too will stay in the shadow of the excellent »The Night That Will Not Die« (2009), just like the other two live albums from 2014 and 2019 (!!!), which…

"Let's wait for the new FM first, but I can already say with a straight face that »Ignition«, Newman's twelfth album in a row and, by the way, one of the best of their career, ranks among the top releases of the year in that archaic genre…

"»Fistful Of Fire« is easily one of the best hard rock albums to drop in the first half of this year. Alongside the new Gotthard record »#13«, it's a must for all the »surviving« fans of the genre. It doesn't get more German than this."

"Harem Scarem today stand in a class of their own among bands in the same genre, quality-wise. Experience, talent, know-how, inspiration! It all adds up every time into a perfect melodic rock cumulus!"

"If you know all four Allen-Lande albums, you have to check out 'Worlds Apart', because it'll fit you like a glove. All it takes is being a fan of Magnus Karlsson's musical approach and his way with arrangements."

""Master Of Illusion" draws inspiration from the time-honored staples of AOR, hard rock and even glam metal, and the result is Ward's vision of melodic rock, which is also seriously sharp on the production side and satisfyingly…

Mr. Di Meola's takes on 14 classics by the legendary Beatles turned out playful and spot-on in every way, so “Across the Universe” should win over fans of the jazz guitar hero and of the unforgettable foursome from Liverpool alike.

" Elixir have risen once again and, once more, stood their ground. They've kept all their trademarks and carried them over to their sixth studio album, which sounds just as you'd expect, as if it were lost in time and space."

"Another studio effort that's pretty damn good overall. Not perfect, nowhere near outstanding, but very nicely packaged and worth your attention. For the more demanding music fans who've followed Ozzy since forever, the new album might…

"The old fart isn't giving up, and in what he takes on with the incredibly inspired “Born Of Fire”, he's hellishly good again and practically untouchable (especially when it comes to his generational uniqueness)."

As if 24 years hadn't passed between the new and previous studio album, but three at most. Welcome home, boys. Let's hope “The God-Shaped Void” isn't your last act.."

With “IIII,” Messrs. Kürsch and Schaffer haven't let anyone down. They've made a top-notch, eclectic album that's sure to please every fan who was sick of waiting fifteen years for the next chapter of the Demons & Wizards project.

"Colosseum Live" is the essential live document of the cult prog rock pioneers and still one of the best windows into their sound and work, even though it left out "Valentyne Suite" and a few other fan favorites.

“Ballistic, Sadistic” grabs you in a thoroughly “Annihilator” way, no doubt about it, it just doesn't ignite quite the way a longtime fan of the band might have wished or expected."

With “Please to See the King”, Steeleye Span made their first folk-rock classic and one of the most eventful albums of their long career, proving they didn't need a drummer to do it.

"The third witches' gathering, dancing with the Devil!"

"Album "#13“ is a fresh, fascinating dive into classic hard rock, Gotthard-recipe style, which the band can't and won't deny. "

"The release of "40th Anniversary - Agents Of Fortune - Live 2016" is a welcome move, if only because it's a nice wake-up call that the iconic fossils of heavy rock aren't done yet and are coming back (let's hope soon) with a promised new…

" Experience, know-how, routine, seasoning, and a long twelve-year stretch of gathering solid songwriting ideas and solutions. All of it has added up once again in just the right place."

"The new, fourth chapter of top-shelf "bonkers" jazz-rock fusion, highly eclectic in nature, serves up more easygoing musical accessibility than theatrical muscle-flexing."

" Fans of Biff Byford's iron voice and Saxon's music in general will be thrilled once again. That's the fundamental takeaway, along with the fact that this is, all in all, a very good new album, backed by a revered vocalist who long ago…

"Lynch's guitar playing has always needed a strong, authoritative vocalist at its side. This time he got one, and "Dirty Shirley" is a phenomenal combination of virtuoso chops and execution from two top-class musicians who, simply put, wow…

"Victor Smolski, whom we've always remembered in the best possible light, delivers a new top-shelf power metal read with the Almanac album "Rush Of Death". It's the hardest Almanac album yet, and in energy it sits close to the Rage-era…

"The album's pile-up of radio hits (from the golden age of AOR) is once again seriously huge, just like the outrageous bombastic hunger The Night Flight Orchestra keep cultivating, "Aeromantic" included."

"The album is exactly what only old, seasoned tomcats who breathed hard rock in the eighties can conjure up and deliver. An incredibly nostalgic record that would have given Black Swan instant commercial success if it had come out in the…

" Sons Of Apollo have grown as a band. The songs feel far more detailed, defined and, for all their progressive looseness, tighter too. Whether this is the creative zenith of the prog-metal Apollos or not, time will tell, but artistically…

"“Circle Of Dolls” doesn't stir up the same interest and excitement as, say, its predecessor “Scatterbrain.” It feels like KXM hit some kind of expressive zenith that closes out their evolution."

"A 'Jornification' of evergreen, radio-friendly hits and a few rock classics, tailor-made for Jorn's most hardcore fans"

" Compared to his two previous solo studio albums, the new one, "Ten," is closer in musical identity and production to what Sweet does with Stryper, though it's a fully self-contained story and a fresh step forward on the colorful musical…

»The Other Side« is the perfect band-aid for all the Nektar nostalgics who never made peace with Albrighton's untimely death and weren't won over by the German version of Nektar, because it's their best album since the end of the seventies.

"If you're into melodic rock, the album »Rise« is going to be right up your alley. It's played, written and produced at an exceptionally high level, and the quality shows. With names this big behind Revolution Saints, you wouldn't have…

"The album "22" boldly smashes the usual templates too. In a tense theater of dark vistas, the kind Ščapec's inner world lays bare in a "brave new mad world," it rattles and shocks the listener. In the feelings it creates, a hopeless…

"Arrangement- and sound-wise, “Vtora mladost, treta svetska vojna” is the band's most mature record to date, and it's also their most ambitious."

"A conformist, safe stance, but one Peavy still handles with skill and knows inside out, and once again it wins him a poker hand full of aces."

"An album where you run into everything, and one you won't get to the bottom of any time soon. From metal to blues, electronic music, jazz, even classic prog rock and psychedelic shenanigans. Want a surprise? Expect the unexpected."

"»Radiocarbon« is the work of battle-hardened old tomcats who know exactly how a composition has to be built in the genre sphere they've been prowling for years, so it grabs you instantly and completely. Innate Swedish perfectionism and…

"“Coat Of Arms” is another superb studio achievement from a legendary band that stays true to its traditional (chiseled) style. On the new album, Wishbone Ash radiate expressive freshness, creative sparkle and even a cheeky playfulness,…

Label: Steel Panther Inc.Release date: September 27, 2019Producer: Jay RustonAlbum length: 35.55 minGenre: Glam MetalRating: 8.0 / 10 Who else but Steel Panther? Finally, an album that clocks in under forty minutes. If only most…

"So the verdict stays the same as with the debut. Worth a try, and after that, whether you take the album or leave it comes down strictly to your criteria, and yours alone."

Label: Samo RecordsRelease date: 17.02.2020Album length: 48.16 minProducer: Samo ŠalamonGenre: ECM / Jazz FusionRating: 10 / 10Buy the album! »Rare Ebb« is the second of two releases born from the collaboration of three refined…

Label: Samo RecordsRelease date: February 17, 2020Album length: 50.14 minProducer: Samo ŠalamonGenre: ECM / Jazz FusionRating: 09 / 10Buy the album! This February saw the release of two albums by a trio that pools the untapped…

"With »Septet«, All Strings Detached reach a new artistic level, one that sends the two women climbing toward musical horizons of new expressive dimensions."

"Damir remains caustic and bilious beyond all limits, a rapid-fire dismantling of the system we're all enslaved to, and in reflecting on the times of our mad present he once again brings it to life with an incredibly juicy, unbridled…

"The Serpent Rings" is very much cut from the same cloth as its predecessor. Magnum conjure up the magic of their golden era (the 1980s) with real success, but for all the 'corrections' they still can't hide Catley's fading vocals.

"If you know this musician's past studio exploits, and especially if you're drawn to albums where the art-magic of pure-blooded guitar playing takes center stage, weaving through the borderlands of hard rock, blues, soft neo-classical…

"Katalena and Clug. A fusion of ballet and Katalena's music, based on an "updated retelling" of Vandot's famous tale, with an effective realization"

"Rotten GrilZ thus deliver with "Punk You" a unique approach to fusing jazz and rock, and without a guitar! Of course, the scales tip toward jazzy free-spiritedness throughout, but the album (especially thanks to Eva Poženel) also leans…

"As always, and for the seventh time running! The compilation »Kočevje špila S srcem« is yet another flawless lexicon of the rich musical pulse of the Kočevje region, serving up a hefty harvest of homegrown original creativity and an…

"With Friends from the Orchestra" is aimed first and foremost at all the loyal Marillion faithful who have long wondered how some of the best pieces in the prog-rock champions' story would sound with string and wind arrangements.

"It's not all about wanting to be recognized, you have to be able to deliver real musical substance too. And »Pobarvanka« is a record that has it, while Le Serpentine prove they're maturing into very skilled arrangers and increasingly…

"Let's hope that, given how deeply the musicians are involved in all sorts of other projects and challenges, Brest stick around and become a fixture, one that keeps enriching the often idea-starved Slovenian music scene with its homegrown,…

Periphery's Hail Stan is definitive proof that the band's energy isn't fading. The whole album brims with creativity and experimentation, and it still sounds unmistakably like them. It's all backed by a lush production where Periphery hold…

"Free Steelar Trio and Rob Mazurek walked onto the stage with no plan whatsoever. They played a good 55 minutes of music and just one single track (Age Of Chaos). The result? A one-of-a-kind adventure."

"The feeling that the record could have offered more interesting substance is definitely there, and yet. Both musicians were brave and bold enough to take on this project, which on the flip side brings plenty of lucidity, mocking gallows…

"With »Kontrapunk«, Koromač have outgrown »Punk Enough?« in artistic maturity. They reach for new approaches and challenges of musical inspiration, and skillfully fold them into their musical vision."

"Indigo is a band that follows a musical vision of blending pop, electronics and traditional collages of Slovenian folk melos, which add a pinch of richness to the band's sonic language. Indigo laid that out with the bold debut »Drugačna«…

"What Wild Strings Trio pulled off so beautifully on their gorgeous studio debut "Lost Weekend", they now deepen, expand and keep nurturing on the new record "Bendjistan"."

"The album »Beautiful Disasters« plugs very successfully into the global (new) pop soul and indie rock aesthetic, with its confessional »conglomerate of homegrown originality« setting the tone and giving it a clear, unburdened streak of…

"A meeting of great truthfulness between two poets, each living in his own time. As the album “Rob” shows, it's one more proof that tear-clear sincerity in art brings evergreen freshness and a timeless quality to a work of art."

"An abrasive rock’n’ roll storm from Prlekija, captured for new times on the fifth outing from this brilliant band of the wide Slovenian rock underground, is a fresh, biting and razor-sharp manifesto of honest rebel attitude and…

"Orlek are back with a mighty, swaggering swing, riding a wave of newly found creative freshness and every element of their trademark miners' rock'n'roll preaching, while showing a whole lot of artistic maturity and wisdom."

»Re-Visited Live!« will delight longtime Arena fans, who get to hear the whole of »The Visitor« played by the current lineup of the cult band, plus a few unforgettable classics, old and new.

Anyone who loves the grand sweep of Hackett's music, both his solo work and the pieces from his Genesis days, is going to have an absolute blast with his first live collaboration with an orchestra.

"Paeth has basically shown up to the party a good 15 years late with this one."

"“Face the Music” easily picks up where the first three albums left off and keeps all the excellence of this quartet, who, with expectations sky-high, have delivered exactly what they had to!"

Even though it was made while the cult band was already falling apart at speed, "Daughter of Time" was a thoroughly solid effort, serving up plenty of interesting and fun moments and pulling Colosseum further away from their blues roots.

The North America-only release “The Grass Is Greener” can hardly be counted as a proper Colosseum studio album. With its calculated moves and recycled earlier material, it comes off as anything but innovative.

" It's all in one! A finished package! Essential and one of a kind, carved out of the unique Angel recipe. Yes. It's possible. Even in 2019. Another unexpected win at this year's "gathering of rock'n'roll dinosaurs."

" “Angel Of Light” isn't as varied as its predecessor “As Above, So Below”, but it keeps all the core elements that define the character of this cult band."

"Of all the artistic moves Tatler has boldly made with his band over the years, often gambling dangerously with the credibility of an old-school metal pose, "The Coffin Train" is the one where Diamond Head come closest, and most…

"It's fair to say the current incarnation of the band hit its creative peak with »Ritual«, and that Tygers Of Pan Tang are living through a kind of new renaissance, a rebirth, and, as our own Avtomobili would put it, a late spring. "

"This EP is clearly a tactical move, a way for the band to bridge the gap between the still-current »Judge Not« and its follow-up, which will be the band's tenth studio album overall."

"Michael Schenker crossbred with his "Flyin' V" electric guitar! Literally. The symbolic "fusion" of the iconic guitarist with his axe lives on with the new Michael Schenker Fest album, another artistic bloom and renaissance"

"Did anyone actually doubt it? The extreme theme park keeps rolling at undiminished speed. Not (yet) at light speed, but extreme in every other way. Just like the (self-parodying) album title says!"

Anyone who can happily accept that “Legacy of the Dark Lands” isn't a 'traditional' Blind Guardian album, but the work of the fully orchestral Blind Guardian Twilight Orchestra project with no metal elements, will enjoy it from start to…

The Valley is undoubtedly a record that proves Whitechapel have plenty of room to move in deathcore if you look at things from a bit outside the box.

Label: Gordeon MusicCompilation length: 126:45 minGenre: art rockRating: 9.0 / 10 Ray Wilson, the much-loved Scottish singer-songwriter who made his name as the frontman of Genesis, Stiltskin and Cut_, and who since 2003 has also been…

“Manifesto of an Alchemist” is in many ways a Stolt solo outing on steroids, one that at times leans hard into his The Flower Kings material.

“The band sticks to a tried-and-tested recipe and doesn't offer anything radically new, but what they do, they do with distinction. Maybe the stronger AOR influence will win over a new fan or two who wouldn't otherwise touch the melodic…

"No Work Of Art album has ever sounded as hungrily revivalist and AOR-ish as "Exhibits". Despite the perfect sound-production and songwriting aesthetic it achieves, it could do with a touch more variety of ideas, and some organic liveliness…

"'Paradigm' is an album where Eclipse merely keep up the level of quality songwriting they've already reached, without developing in any way anymore. That's why 'Paradigm' can no longer surprise you in the slightest."

"While Sabaton aren't exactly reinventing the wheel with the new album, this time they've added more keyboards plus choir and orchestral parts. But at their core, they stay true to themselves. So if you like any Sabaton album, you'll very…

The first The Flower Kings studio album of the "post-Bodin era," and their thirteenth overall if you don't count "Manifesto of an Alchemist," turned out great, even if it lacks a bit more ambition to reach masterpiece status and join the…

"All in all. A nice album from a legendary musician. Worth a spin. But all three cult classics of the eighties remain untouchable."

"Old-school true believers will probably stick with this band's older records, because this time around Steel Prophet are dancing through notes that are just too soft."