Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10
Ashbury Keys last, for now, full album was released back in 2004 and as with their debut release, the follow up Dancers and the E.P. Wake Up that was to come, the music that this power-pop trio creates is of such a high standard, a cornucopia of quality that it feels such a shame that Growing Up was the last big piece of work by this incredibly likeable band.
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It was the album that made Joe Walsh initially but as he and the band Barnstorm cut this record 40 years ago, he couldn’t have imagined what was just that little further down the road as one of the seminal groups in American music history came knocking for him.
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There have been many celebrated writers throughout Ireland’s incredible literary past, Seamus Heaney and James Joyce to name but two and in both of these great men and their renowned, illustrious works can be found the template of story-telling that encompasses Kevin Doherty and his latest album Seeing Things.
Like Joyce in his seminal book Dubliners or one of Seamus Heaney’s many poems there is a construct of narrative that is almost unique to both these men and Kevin Doherty. The music, whilst hauntingly beautiful and as serene as the countryside of Ireland is almost secondary to the voice, the splendid outpouring, humbly delivered but with an exuberance, a joyful melancholy that is hard to beat or replicate.
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Sometimes it seems that you can come across a band that you instantly fall for when you weren’t even looking. As when you stop looking for that one special person and just concentrate on the small things that make you happy and take life on a day to day basis, out of nowhere they come and take root in your life. Such is the effect of Glasgow band King King and their Blues styled rock and their album Standing In The Shadows on the heart that for a while you cannot think of anything better to listen to every night.
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If any more proof were needed that the Metal scene in the lands that make up the large expanse of Scandinavia, a huge resounding piece of musical evidence makes its way via Spinefarm Records in the form of Finnish band Kalmah and their brand new album Seventh Swamphony.
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Somewhere between Ashbury Keys debut album being unleashed and the release of Dancers in 2001, the Texas Power pop trio took a trip from very good into the territory of the outstanding band they would become.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 7/10
Even the disinterested and unfathomable will concede somewhere, no matter how begrudgingly and with fists clenched in anger, that Status Quo must be doing something right to have released 30 albums and over 70 singles. The music that in part defined an era for their fans still has the power to get a broad smile from almost anyone at some point, to nod in agreement should it come on a pub jukebox and enjoy the brief respite the simply crafted songs offer. It is up-beat and sometimes can be shockingly great stuff.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
Invisible Empire/Crescent Moon marks a new line in the sand for K T Tunstall, perhaps the start of new beginning for the Scottish singer/musician as she comes to terms with life and what it offers.
The raw emotion that filters through every track on the album is one that will endear her to her legion of fans as every sinew, muscle and vessel is to put the test, given a reason to howl at the desert moon. Ms. Tunstall takes advantage of this feeling and produces a thoughtful and somewhat considered performance in the studio, whilst all the time seeking answers to some very age old and relevant questions that every human being asks at one point or another during their life time.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10
At one point, you can almost catch yourself thinking, and with the greatest of respect to the legend and dearly missed Ronni James Dio, why oh why did Black Sabbath ever fracture and tear themselves apart? The answer quickly springs to mind and you are left lamenting what could have been during that period but like all good tales of good and evil, of heroes and villains, the Black Sabbath story is not finished yet as their stunning new album 13 will attest.
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The problem can be sometimes that we by nature become too accustomed in the way we live, some comfortably others not so, that as individuals and as a body of people we shy away from taking risks for fear of being perhaps embarrassed or heaven forbid, being seen as unproductive in a world that has got so quick and busy. So much so, that put your feet up for an hour and listen to something out of a so called comfort zone could be classed as self-indulgent and not part of the new way of thinking.