Label: Frontiers Music Srl.
Release date: December 4, 2020
Production: Michael Palace
Album length: 47.25 min
Genre: AOR/melodic rock
Rating: 9.5/10
Behind the name Palace hides Swedish composer, producer, vocalist and multi-instrumentalist Michael Palace. Michael is yet another monstrous wizard when the talk turns to session work and collaborations with all sorts of artists, the kind who lean on outside collaborators when it comes to writing album material. Michael Palace simply has that innate knack for building a song with a rock-solid verse-and-chorus combo, so the thing grabs you instantly and just works. And we’re talking melodic rock and AOR revivalism here.
Michael Palace first made serious noise about those talents after joining the First Signal project, which also featured Harem Scarem vocalist Harry Hess. The reputation kept growing in the Cry of Dawn project, teamed up with Swedish vocalist Goran Edman, and in Kryptonite, where creative forces were joined with The Poodles singer Jakob Samuel and Pride of Lions singer Toby Hitchcock. Over the years Michael Palace has lent recording, songwriting and production services to the likes of Adrenaline Rush, Houston, Big Time, Gutterdämerung, Find Me and Miljenko Matijevic. None of this escaped the A&R people at Frontiers Music Srl, who signed the musician. Under the name Palace, Michael Palace has so far released two studio albums, “Master Of The Universe” and “Binary Music”.
Michael Palace is one of those exceptional “one man band” talents. It’s downright unbelievable how slickly the musical ideas get packaged into finished songs, all while “borrowing” just as slickly from the AOR pioneering days of the eighties and the late seventies too. The album’s production is brilliant once again. Even though it’s 2021, the contrasts between the building blocks of the sound are accentuated and intensified, very much in eighties style. The influence of the west-coast (American) AOR approach is strong, especially in the songwriting principle, the way the legendary Jim Peterik goes about it. You guessed it: at times the closest relative is the music of Survivor, here and there an association with Foreigner pops up, and with Toto too (in their biggest AOR moments of the eighties, e.g. the song “When It’s Over”) or Rick Springfield (e.g. the excellent closer “Fight”). Newer acts like Newman, Houston and Work of Art are even a good enough compass for where this is all heading.
Truth be told, the single “Way Up Here” is the least interesting track on the album. It even turns out that picking it as the lead single wasn’t the best call. The brilliantly catchy “Hot Steel” would have done a lot better in that spot. Luckily, the singles “Castaway” and “Cold Ones” later set the expectations straight.
Michael Palace is perfection. There’s an outstanding sense for developing musicality, and a seriously sly talent for building those hooky moods up into full-on pomp and drama theater. And yes, everything was done solo. Some clicking and programming was surely unavoidable, but that hardly matters. The vocal is what counts most. It’s a real magnet and tailor-made for the genre Michael is working in. All the other elements that dress up the vocal and build the instrumental soundscape are laid out in brilliant balance. Upfront guitar phrasing surrounded by layers of synths loaded with that shimmering, bubbling (in a good way) eighties sonic character, in a constantly tasteful contrast with the springy rhythm section. Then there’s the lead vocal getting extra vocal harmonies at exactly the right moments and in exactly the right spots. Polished guitar solos are all present and accounted for, and an album like this is a real joy to listen to because, despite the usual formulaic predictability, it delivers a pile of details that Michael Palace craftily slipped in while arranging the songs. From the sax solo in “Cold Ones” to the fact that, in the opening title track “Rock And Roll Radio”, the snare got backed up with an extra cowbell beat, which, given the high musical in-your-faceness, instantly snaps the listener’s focus. A highly vibrant opener with that proper triumphant swagger that defines eighties radio rock. Like good old Stan Bush, for example. Twelve tracks is a lot, but it’s all packaged incredibly smoothly, with the desired creative and compositional variety developed between the songs. The album doesn’t lack a ballad either, “Eleonora”, and it can speak in darker tones too, as the song “My Gray Cloud” shows. So? Knowledge, talent, experience. Incredible. And with new studio albums at short intervals, while constantly busy with other musical projects.
I won’t drag this out. “Rock And Roll Radio” is an excellent new little brother to both predecessors, “Master Of The Universe” and “Binary Music”. Extremely compact, constantly irresistible, with a heap of ultra-catchy chorus melodies that will keep you firmly in a state of excited arousal throughout. That is, as long as you’re a fervent and devoted fan of AOR, because what’s in front of you is a truly very good album of this kind of genre revivalism. With the new album, Michael Palace confirmed that in the craft of the musical sphere he rules with such mastery, he simply has no equal. This is an incredibly accomplished musician who is all things in one. So all that’s left is the conclusion. “Rock And Roll Radio” will simply charm every lover of AOR and its revivalism and keep them happy for a long time. Needless to add, this is an album made for long night drives you wish would never end.
Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Track list:
1. Rock And Roll Radio
2. Castaway
3. Way Up Here
4. Cold Ones
5. Eleonora
6. Hot Steel
7. My Gray Cloud
8. Origin Of Love
9. She’s So Original
10. Strictly By The Rules
11. When It’s Over
12. Fight
Lineup:
Michael Palace – vocals, all instruments
Guest musicians:
Oscar Bromvall – guitar solo on track 6
Jordan Cox – backing vocals on track 2
