Category Archives: Music

Queensryche, Queensryche. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Obituaries that had been written can now be filed, shredded and destroyed, the king may have seemed to breathe a final terminal breath, outdone by seeing double at the last but Queensryche lives on. In some bizarre way there are now two Queensryches fighting for the crown as if stuck in some York/Lancaster melodrama for the nation of England. Geoff Tate, the former vocalist of the band Queensryche, now with his own band…Queensryche in one corner and the carriers of the flame with Todd La Torre at the helm ready to storm battlements and carry this new rejuvenated band forward. There really can be only one winner, the King is dead but Queensryche will survive.

Queensryche, Queensryche. Album Review. full post

(396 words, estimated 1:35 mins reading time)

Lloyd Cole, Standards. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Some people don’t need to have big charting hits to know that they are loved by their core audience, what they release will always seem to be taken to the crowd’s heart and much played, that though doesn’t pay the bills in a world that has become increasingly, despairing and depressingly about how you are defined is by what you are worth in monetary value to others and not for the enjoyment or sense of love you may install in others.

Lloyd Cole, Standards. Album Review. full post

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

Kerry Ellis And Brian May, Acoustic By Candlelight. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

There are many things that are worth repeating in life so soon after first experiencing them; your first passionate kiss, the first book that spoke to you and awoke something deep about yourself, the first play that made you laugh so hard you forgot you were in a different set of company and a gig that delighted and entranced you.

On the back of their tour in 2012, Kerry Ellis and Brian May recorded songs from various venues and have released them in time for the 2013 Born Free Tour on a delightful new album, Acoustic By Candlelight.

Kerry Ellis And Brian May, Acoustic By Candlelight. Album Review. full post

(392 words, estimated 1:34 mins reading time)

Ian McNabb, Eclectic Warrior. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

If you come across Ian McNabb at a gig or sitting in a pub somewhere in Liverpool over the next few months, politely shake him by the hand and tell him what a fantastic and expansive recording Eclectic Warrior is. You would be doing one of Liverpool’s finest sons a great honour because it is not just fantastic, this is Ian McNabb, the man who can sing Pink Floyd harmonies with random strangers and make the interloper sound polished and professional, at his very, very best. Part belligerent, confrontational, creatively fiery and impassioned in his lyrics, wonderfully passionate in his music and if Great Things in 2010 was a huge stepping stone, this sees Ian leaping gaping chasms in the music cause.

Ian McNabb, Eclectic Warrior. Album Review. full post

(445 words, estimated 1:47 mins reading time)

The Jooks, E.P. Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 7/10

There is a lot to be said for the genre of Power Pop, along with the imagery of well crafter three or so minutes well-crafted song, it gives prominence to a section of music that sometimes gets lost in the overarching field of popular music. The initial years that saw the rise of crisp harmonies, a belting guitar sound with no need to Segway off into a solo performance that may as well hold its own concert seem so long ago now but there were some great bands throughout the years since those first forays against the music being force fed the post-war teenager and The Jooks have released a very cool self-titled E.P. to stand amongst them.

The Jooks, E.P. Review. full post

(390 words, estimated 1:34 mins reading time)

Lena Anderssen, Letters From The Faroes. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

The Faroe Islands might not be on top of the vast majority of people’s thoughts when it comes listening to music, it is a shame as the tiny archipelago with a population of about 50,000 has some excellent traditional music of which it justly and rightly proud but also some incredible contemporary musicians who give their all in their performance and studio albums.  One such musician is Lena Anderssen.

Lena Anderssen’s 2011 album Letters From The Faroes fills any musical void that may have opened up between the U.K. and the small set of islands is immediately plugged completely by the tantalising music on offer by the young Faroese woman.

Lena Anderssen, Letters From The Faroes. Album Review. full post

(403 words, estimated 1:37 mins reading time)

Kingbathmat, Overcoming The Monster. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Progressive Rock isn’t quite the same without a band releasing two great and phenomenal albums within a year of each other, Queen, when they were Prog managed it, Genesis revelled in it and now Kingbathmat show exactly why critics and the public loved them when they released Truth Button and now, just a few short months on they have come back with astounding Overcoming The Monster.

Kingbathmat, Overcoming The Monster. Album Review. full post

(405 words, estimated 1:37 mins reading time)

Ashbury Keys, Growing Up. Album Review.

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.

Ashbury Keys, Growing Up. Album Review. full post

(395 words, estimated 1:35 mins reading time)

Joe Walsh, The Smoker You Drink, The Player You Get. 40th Anniversary Retrospective.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

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.

Joe Walsh, The Smoker You Drink, The Player You Get. 40th Anniversary Retrospective. full post

(818 words, estimated 3:16 mins reading time)

Kevin Doherty, Seeing Things. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

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.

Kevin Doherty, Seeing Things. Album Review. full post

(334 words, estimated 1:20 mins reading time)