Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Artist: Thunder
Label: Ear Music Records
Release: 2017
Length: 51:19
Rating: 4/5
British hard rock veterans, the one and only Thunder, are back after two years with a new, eleventh studio album, »Rip It Up«. A few years back it looked like the band had called it quits, or at least that’s the kind of official word we got after the release of »Bang!« (2008). Truth be told, »Bang!« did sound a bit tired, and the band a little creatively run dry, even if it was a solid record. Clearly the creative break did them a world of good. In 2011 Thunder reunited, to the great joy of their fans. That gave us the excellent comeback album »Wonder Days« in 2015, and its successor »Rip it Up« keeps that brilliant creative mood, which reigns in the band in their golden years, going strong.
Thunder are one of those bands that apparently just don’t know how to grow old at heart. They still make that lucid hard rock, packed with a bagful of sparkling black humor, that’s completely one of a kind in this corner of the galaxy and could only be born on British soil. In that respect, when it comes to lyrics, Thunder are very close to their older heroes Deep Purple. The troubles are always the same. One man’s battles with temptation at every turn: booze, drugs, and then of course a pile of women messing up the plans in everyday life situations. Thunder are also full of self-irony and know how to poke fun at themselves in a really endearing way. Their humor is downright venomous and contagious. Take the lazily swaying closer There’s Always a Loser, dressed up with a pinch of pop charisma; She Likes the Cocaine doesn’t dodge this element either, and the album itself opens in just such a manner, with a catchy, exuberant jab and an impressive lead guitar line in No One Gets Out Alive. Danny Bowes’s voice has also thinned out a little over the years, and at moments it gently recalls his »infamous« countryman Ian Gillan from the eighties Deep Purple days, though the timbre is closer to Steve Overland (FM), and the approach to vocal interpretation and the way of singing is certainly a whole different story.
»Rip it Up« also serves up eleven carefully polished songs with tightly defined arrangements and well-crafted transitions between verses and choruses that all get along nicely. It’s an incredibly fluid and dynamic album. The production keeps the virtue of an organic feel and authentic live vibe, as if the band were playing the tracks one after another like a gig in the studio, with just a single take, the way they used to record in the old days when all anybody knew was analog tape. A clearly audible blues element is again mixed into the songs, one the band masterfully carried into its sound long ago from the legacy of the »white blues boom« that set off a real fire in the late sixties, not just in Britain but all over the world. At the same time Thunder are once again full of highly intelligent musicality, and they shine at it as they hunt for the right solutions and carefully place them in the right spots in the compositions. There are moments that bring Free to mind (Another Life), and even sooner Led Zeppelin, like the lead phrase of The Enemy Inside, and they also owe a thank-you for inspiration to those rock’n’roll giants in two transitions within Heartbreak Hurricane, where they actually, quite mischievously and on purpose, steer toward the development of the lead phrase in the closing part of the Led Zeppelin classic Kashmir.
Melancholy, mockery and »party time« in an extraordinary dialogue of full-blooded reconciliation. Primal rock’n’roll punch throughout, perfectly balanced with moments of melancholic restraint, strung together by softer compositional figures. Rip It up is a superbly seasoned, idea-rich and compositionally well-defined new album that brings all the right trademarks of the expressive and contagious impact of the musical recipe of the one and only Thunder.
Thunder – No One Gets Out Alive (official video):
Lineup
Danny Bowes – vocals
Luke Morley – guitar
Chirs Matthews – guitar
Chris Childs – bass
“Harry” James – drums
GUEST MUSICIANS:
Lynne Jackman – backing vocals, tambourine and additional vocals on track no. 3
Heather Findlay – backing vocals
Susie Webb – backing vocals
Production
Luke Morley
Tracklist
01. No One Gets Out Alive
02. Rip It Up
03. She Likes The Cocaine
04. Right From The Start
05. Shakedown
06. Heartbreak Hurricane
07. In Another Life
08. The Chosen One
09. The Enemy Inside
10. Tumbling Down
11. There’s Always A Loser
