Category Archives: Music

The Bad Shepherds, Mud, Blood And Beer. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

There are cover versions and then there are real humdingers, songs that have been given such a new lease of life that they buzz with a new purpose that thrills the musical soul. Many musicians and boy bands can recreate the sound of a much loved anthem, the pop classic, the standard bearer of a generation who knew the song inside out and adored it but somehow it gets rehashed by the latest so called boy band and the song somehow loses its power. Then there are The Bad Shepherds and the incredible folk twist they bring to music which illuminates that power and gives it a new meaning.

The Bad Shepherds, Mud, Blood And Beer. Album Review. full post

(463 words, estimated 1:51 mins reading time)

Caves, One. E.P. Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

If you can listen to the Caves’ new E.P., One, and not feel the pulse, the sensation of something that grips the attention and the raw emotion that is stamped throughout the three tracks, then there is no hope for you. The pothole that you poked your head over and scanned the musical horizon briefly may just be too comfortable for you too ever leave.

Caves, One. E.P. Review. full post

(327 words, estimated 1:18 mins reading time)

Arrow Highway, Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Listening to music in the comfort of your own home is an enjoyable way to take in the thoughts and words of an artist, the soothe reassurance of what is familiar surrounding new music is tangible and concrete. Some albums though need the experience of being heard whilst you are out in the open, away from the confines of four walls and being urged to take the imagination by the hand and showing it a different way of life, an image to hang the music onto. This way of looking at music works wonderfully well especially when it is a pure and defined set of instrumentals as Mike Chylinski’s new project Arrow Highway.

Arrow Highway, Album Review. full post

(380 words, estimated 1:31 mins reading time)

Thom Morecroft, Moon Moon Shake It. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

If all roads lead to Rome, then does the River Mersey beckon with its delicate welcoming sound of its history and people and toss and crash of its deep blue water for musicians far and wide to take residence beside its shores and bring something of their talent and then infuse the artist’s natural gift with something solid, something incredible? Many it seems are called to Liverpool, countless are even chosen and the city of absolute culture embraces them, for Thom Morecroft, a man from the wilds of Shropshire, and his album Moon Moon Shake It, it seems that enticing wink from the Mersey has captured a man who will not let anything stand in his way.

Thom Morecroft, Moon Moon Shake It. Album Review. full post

(367 words, estimated 1:28 mins reading time)

Tragedian, Decimation. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Decimation, either a slaughter or annihilation, a battering of the senses in which the only chance you have of salvation is keep on playing the album until you work out exactly why the new album by German Power Metal band Tragedian seems so formidable.

Tragedian, Decimation. Album Review. full post

(389 words, estimated 1:33 mins reading time)

Reuben Archer, Personal Sin. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Reuben Archer’s pedigree stands before him like an outstretched monument, adorned with the knowledge that it symbolises something extra, that little piece of musical ingenuity that many strive for but just fall short of. It also takes an incredible talent to pull the amount of superb guest musicians to perform on his debut solo album and when you have the supreme gift of genius as Magnum’s/Thunder’s Harry James, Status Quo’s John ‘Rhino’ Edwards, Neil Murray, the great Luke Morley and Paul Raymond on the album, then it’s not so much as a Personal Sin, but a statement of special intent.

Reuben Archer, Personal Sin. Album Review. full post

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

Marcella Detroit, The Vehicle. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Albums come and go, pop stars appear and disappear with frightening regularity and yet the artist digs away at your soul with a kindness and sincerity that those who litter the charts of popularity can probably never hope to achieve. The artist stays in the listener’s heart and makes themselves at home forever. Even with a large distance in time between albums, what comes along can be thrilling, soulful and takes the listener on the next stage of their life hand in hand with them.

Marcella Detroit, The Vehicle. Album Review. full post

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

Robin Beck, Underneath. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

In days when the abhorrence of misogynistic verbal sexual barbarity seems to be making a very unwelcome and unpleasant come back, Robin Beck and her latest album Underneath shows that no matter how some might try, you just cannot keep a good woman down.

Robin Beck, Underneath. Album Review. full post

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

Billy Joel, An Innocent Man. 30th Anniversary Retrospective.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

For anyone in the U.K. or Europe who loved their music to have an American twist then the Summer of 1983 saw Billy Joel, one of the biggest music artists ever from the United States, have perhaps arguably the most commercially incredible time of his career to date as he released the stunning An Innocent Man onto the music world.

Billy Joel, An Innocent Man. 30th Anniversary Retrospective. full post

(1648 words, estimated 6:36 mins reading time)

Oli Brown, Songs From The Road. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

When competing against some of the most influential Blues artists in an era when the genre seems to have flourished exponentially, with both genders quite rightly having major success, critically as well as pleasing the every burgeoning audience, to release a live album rather than a recording in which to offer something new might be considered slightly reckless. However in Oli Brown, the word reckless should never be used, it would be a wild impulse to label something so pure as irresponsible and in Oli Brown’s Songs From The Road, the laid back beauty of his work is more than enough to understand that to be captured live on recording is sometimes a good thing.

Oli Brown, Songs From The Road. Album Review. full post

(388 words, estimated 1:33 mins reading time)