Artist: Thin Lizzy
Label: Vertigo Records
Release: 1983
Length: 40.37
Everybody knows you can’t teach an old dog new tricks. Well, almost everybody. Lynott and his Lizzy comrades-in-arms apparently didn’t in 1983, at least judging by Thunder And Lightning. Blindly chasing the musical trends of the early eighties, the boys dive headfirst into a world that’s way too foreign and incomprehensible to them: the new phenomenon of the British music scene called Heavy Metal.
Thin Lizzy had run into a similar problem before, one we can safely call an identity crisis. Back then Gary Moore came to Lynott’s rescue, filling the void left by Roberston’s departure, which had changed the face of Thin Lizzy dramatically, and he did it brilliantly. But if Moore was a bullseye, the story of recruiting another guitar hero, John Sykes, ends a lot less happily, if at all. The fresh wind that blew in with Heavy Metal shifted the balance of power on the music scene, and Thin Lizzy, sadly, were no match for it. Every attempt at a more modern, heavier take on hard rock, at times almost heavy metal, ends miserably. Even worse. With all the guitar assaults from Gorham and Sykes, there’s less and less room for Lynott’s trademark lyrical storytelling, without which we can’t really talk about Thin Lizzy at all. Instead, Lynott’s crew tries to win us over with a display of Sykes’s fast-fingered string bending, which, backed by Darren’s plastic keyboards, shows that Thin Lizzy are just one more in a long line of bands that time ran over ages ago. Brian Downey earns the most sympathy, since the guy stays firmly in his element through all of Lizzy’s metamorphoses. As for Phil Lynott, the man just doesn’t sound convincing in his new heavy guise.
The last Thin Lizzy album kicks off with a clap of thunder on Thunder And Lightning, which suddenly unleashes a barrage of colorless guitar riffs. This simple hard rock number is basically a recycled Are You Ready at a faster tempo. Everyone who loves Lynott’s soft voice will have a hard time making peace with his reckless babbling here. Sykes’s ripping guitar solo is a bit more fun, with John taking over the role of lead guitarist from Gorham right from the start and breaking the last of the band’s unwritten rules. With his dominant and stylistically totally different approach, Sykes demands that Gorham give up his characteristically fluid playfulness altogether. The duo obviously wants to present their relationship to the listener as one homogeneous whole, and unfortunately it doesn’t work. The cherry on top of this soulless, bludgeoning intro is Wharton’s nasty, synthetic and, to top it off, way-too-prominent solo. Polka lovers, your moment arrives with This Is The One. This ridiculous creation gets “epic” proportions thanks to Wharton’s creepy backdrop, while Sykes and Gorham try to give the whole thing a new, trendier look with a series of breakneck guitar passages. All in vain. The new lineup finally proves its credibility with Lynott’s The Sun Goes Down. Probably mostly thanks to Gorham’s brilliantly executed solo, which for a moment even takes us far back to the days of romantic Thin Lizzy twin harmonies. The typically simple bass line, around which the whole message of the song is traditionally built, offers a similar taste of the old glory. And that’s all that’s left of the old Thin Lizzy. The dangerous trip down memory lane is cut short by The Holy War, which together with the proper hard-rocker rush of Cold Sweat makes up the hardest-hitting moment of the whole album. John Sykes is certainly the one dominating both tracks with his fiery playing, but what’s the use when every single line Lynott delivers makes it all sound totally insincere and pretentious again.
We get closest to a more convincing “new wave” Thin Lizzy makeover with Someday She Is Going To Hit Back, where even Wharton’s plastic solo, for once, doesn’t cause any serious stomach trouble. Someday.. and Baby Please Don’t Go, completely unexpectedly, end up being, alongside The Sun Goes Down, the only halfway decent songs on this utterly empty album, whose closers Bad Habits and Heart Attack quietly whisper the fact that Thunder And Lightning is simply one Thin Lizzy album too many.
Lineup
Phil Lynott: vocals/bass
Scott Gorham: guitar
John Sykess: guitar
Brian Downey: drums
Darren Wharton: keyboards
Production
Thin Lizzy and Chris Tsangarides
Tracklist
1.Thunder And Lightning
2.This Is The One
3.The Sun Goes Down
4.The Holy War
5.Cold Sweat
6.Someday She Is Going To Hit Back
7.Baby Please Don’t Go
8.Bad Habits
9.Heart Attack
