Category Archives: Music

Vamps, Bloodsuckers. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

When you’re big in Japan, pretty much you can be assured a cult following anywhere in the world. Such is the sphere of influence that the nation has in business and in the arts, that whatever niche following is available, it gets consumed with relish but also admired for its intricate and absorbing nature. This is especially true when something from within the islands, come out with powerful, complex and a fascination of an art form perhaps more keenly associated with its Western acquaintances.

Vamps, Bloodsuckers. Album Review. full post

(424 words, estimated 1:42 mins reading time)

Inside View, Hollywood. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Who wouldn’t want all that glistens beneath the beckoning sign that sits in the Californian hills, the bright lights of a million stars and their sometimes inevitable fading careers, the welcoming handshake and the talking down of orders as one face fits and a thousand others fall by the way side. Hollywood has it all, the fame, the glamour and the dirt and it takes a special breed of person to want to try their luck there.

Inside View, Hollywood. Album Review. full post

(363 words, estimated 1:27 mins reading time)

Joe Bonamassa, Muddy Wolf At Red Rocks. Live Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

It’s always tempting to wonder how certain genres or moods will be viewed fifty years in the future, when the generation who shaped a period of time will perhaps have shuffled off into the sunset and those that followed in their wake are left to assess what exactly their music meant to them. It’s a tempting thought filled with the potential to be uplifting and equally, sobering.

Joe Bonamassa, Muddy Wolf At Red Rocks. Live Album Review. full post

(539 words, 1 image, estimated 2:09 mins reading time)

Rich McMahon, Songs Of Exile, Love And Dissent. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

Rich McMahon exemplifies the thought that eventually you can and must find your own voice in which to relate tales and stories to. It is an obligation to humanity to be able to look at people in the face and whisper a truth to them and hope that it some small way it opens up a dialogue between souls, or if that fails then at least the artist has opened themselves up to an audience willing to listen.

Rich McMahon, Songs Of Exile, Love And Dissent. Album Review. full post

(412 words, estimated 1:39 mins reading time)

Brandi Carlile, The Firewatcher’s Daughter. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

There is something in Brandi Carlile’s voice that just resonates with an abiding truth, something that burns equally with fire, brimstone and rage and yet could hold the gentlest of whispers of love and concern in the palm of a hand as if it was a butterfly being caressed by a tranquil breeze. That juxtaposition between light and the shadow, one cannot live without the other it seems and in her new release, The Firewatcher’s Daughter; that truth is solid, without fear and as compulsive a listen as you could hope for.

Brandi Carlile, The Firewatcher’s Daughter. Album Review. full post

(358 words, estimated 1:26 mins reading time)

Europe, War Of Kings. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * *

There is always a power behind the throne, literature understands that, politics revels in its darkness and music hints at it, perhaps more so in veiled comments and sideways glances in the artistically rounded lyric, but none the less it exists and on paper for Europe’s latest album War Of Kings it is a sound premise to delve into.

Europe, War Of Kings. Album Review. full post

(432 words, estimated 1:44 mins reading time)

The Shires, Brave. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Music has no borders, it has certain areas of influence which can undoubtedly be traced back to a particular area or region. Unlike though the political machinations in which many try to claim a piece of land as their own, to demand that one genre of music only exists to serve the purpose of the people that thrive, live or stagnate because of a certain group or variety is to court absurdity.

The Shires, Brave. Album Review. full post

(502 words, estimated 2:00 mins reading time)

The BlueBones, Saved By The Blues. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

Blues cannot be simply ignored. For quite a while and in the dim and now thankful long since past, it could and had to be, for it was in serious danger of developing a skin so thick that even the greatest and most respectful of criticisms were dealt with by purists as being a snide remark on the whole historic genre. Thankfully the armour has been dropped with the appearance of musicians such as Joe Bonamassa, Joanne Shaw Taylor, Danny Bryant and incredible and numerous others, that the genre is to the lay person and the keen amateur vital and full of passion once more.

The BlueBones, Saved By The Blues. Album Review. full post

(400 words, estimated 1:36 mins reading time)

Ma Polaine’s Great Decline, Got Me Out Of Hell. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9.5/10

A rare treat in life should be enjoyed as much as possible, it is something that should also be viewed as being perhaps as unique in your life, collection or something that you desperately want to share with the world at large. It can also be felt deep down, in the fiery pit of covertness and beautiful secrets that the soul demands you keep, is something that you know you only want your own ears to behold; even if it for the shortest while.

Ma Polaine’s Great Decline, Got Me Out Of Hell. Album Review. full post

(383 words, estimated 1:32 mins reading time)

Paul Wilkes, River Running With Me. E.P. Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

It is an almost inalienable fact that for the people that make up the islands and lands of Great Britain, water, whether in the form of the crashing sea that dominates the paintings of Turner, the gentleness of the stream babbling through country fields and pulling at the stems of flowers in full bloom or the mightiest rivers that cities stride alongside, the Mersey, the Thames, the Rae, the Clyde, the Taff or the Tyne, all are constant and as Paul Wilkes more than beautifully shows on his latest E.P., there is a River Running With Me.

Paul Wilkes, River Running With Me. E.P. Review. full post

(360 words, estimated 1:26 mins reading time)