Category: Album Review

Jeff Scott Soto – ‘The Duets Collection, Vol. 1’ (2021) – Album Review (The Jeff Scott Soto Series)

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During the Covid Pandemic, Jeff had time on his hands since he wasn’t touring the world. However, that doesn’t mean he sat around twiddling his thumbs. Nope. Instead he decided to revisit some old songs. Now, he wasn’t thinking of doing another album like ‘Revisions’ and thank goodness for that. Instead, he re-recorded a bunch of his classic songs throughout his career and the twist was he invited a bunch of his fellow musical friends that could sing and do the songs as duets. And the line-up he has is second to none. They are some of the most exciting new melodic rock singers in the field and some that are legends in their own right.

He used a bunch of his bandmates and friends also to handle the music. Most of these names you will recognize if you’ve been following along on this series. He had Jorge Salan (guitars), Howie Simon (guitars), Leo Mancini (guitars), Tony Dickinson (bass) and Edu Cominato (drums). And let me tell you, they really brought these songs to life and made them sound fresh and more modern in some cases. These guys are playing songs by Yngwie Malmsteen, Axel Rudi Pell and Marcel Jacobs so they have to step up their game and let me tell you they do just that. The combination of this band, Jeff’s powerhouse vocals and these incredible guest singers actually surprised me with an album that at first I went…”really?”… but by the end I was like…”Hell Yeah!!”. The album came out on October 8, 2021 and continued his run with Frontier Records and what a run it has been. Enough chit chat, let’s get to the music.

The album opens with a high energy, bombastic guitar rocker called “Livin’ the Life” from the Rock Star soundtrack and what a way to open the album. Jeff had his W.E.T. bandmate, Erik Martensson, dueting with him and this one and if you’ve heard the W.E.T. albums, then you know what a lethal combo these two are together. This is not a song Jeff plays a lot, so what a pleasure to have this one covered and a sign of great things to come. If you were expecting an album full of ballads, you’d be so wrong.

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The Defiants – ‘Drive’ (2023) – Album Review

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The boys are back with their third album. The boys, of course, are Paul Laine, Bruno Ravel and Rob Marcello or more properly known as The Defiants. The band was brought together back in 2016 thanks to Frontiers Records. I was worried this was going to be a one and done, but thankfully that wasn’t the case.

I spoke with Paul Laine a couple years ago and I knew he was working on this album. And about 6 months later, when I was exchanging emails with him, he was coming up on his deadline to submit the album to Frontiers. He seemed a little stressed, but in a good way. This was around January 2022. I am not sure what happened, but the album didn’t see the light of day for another 18 months. I hope to talk with him again soon and I will make sure to see what was going on. Regardless, as of June 7, 2023, we have the new Defiants album and I couldn’t be happier.

The guys had worked together before in a band called Danger Danger, you remember them from the late 80’s and 90’s. The Defiants were made to recapture that 80’s rock magic and capture it they did. I will try not to be biased as I am a huge Paul Laine fan and I pretty much love everything he does and there is a reason for that…he is one of the best vocalists in the business and his voice gets stronger as he ages. He does not disappoint here either. In fact no one does. This is my album of the Summer and in fact, could wind up as album of the Year. Yes, I said it! And here’s why…

The album opens with a scorcher in “Hey Life” which is a massive anthemic rocker. And listen to that opening guitar riff…does it not sound like “Rise” by Extreme??? Which is wild as both albums came out on the same day. Paul’s vocals soar as he tells life to get out of his way. The drums are pounding, the guitars are a rip-roaring shredfest and the song makes a massive opening statement.

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Bon Jovi – ‘The Albums Box Set’ (2017) – Album Review (The Bon Jovi Collection Series)

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We are starting out things a little different. We aren’t starting with the earliest Bon Jovi piece in the collection. We are going to start the Bon Jovi Collection Series with the piece that convinced me to start the series. I picked this up around Christmas of last year and when I had all the album on vinyl, I thought, let’s do it. I took some time filling some holes in the collection and arranging what I wanted to review and now here we are. Currently this collection is going to take some time as there are around 60 pieces to review so this will take over a year to complete so I hope you are along for the ride. We will save the history of the band and how it got started to later. For now, let’s look at this box set in all its glory.

The Box Set was released on February 10, 2017 and was released on both vinyl and CD. I chose the Vinyl collection as I love to have their albums on vinyl. The set carries all studio albums up to that point which means it stops at ‘This House is Not For Sale’. But that isn’t all, it has both Jon Bon Jovi solo albums as well as an “Extra” LP with a bunch of their international B-Sides which is a nice treat. But that is it. There no extra posters, stickers, booklets or anything. Each album though is remastered on 180g LP and the 16 albums are spread over 24 LPs. At the time this was released, 7 of the albums had never been released on vinyl and then you have the “Extra” LP which is the first time this had ever been released. So, for the vinyl collector this was the easiest way to get everything. Now, they did release the albums individually, well the Bon Jovi ones were, I don’t think I ever saw the Jon Bon albums ever in the stores…I mean ever.

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W.E.T. – ‘Retransmission’ (2021) – Album Review (The Jeff Scott Soto Series)

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As we now know as we are now on their fourth studio album, W.E.T. is a culmination of some great artist including Robert Sall of the band Work of Art (The “W”); Erik Martensson of the band Eclipses (The “E”) and Jeff Scott Soto of the band Talisman (The “T”). All three bands are Swedish bands and all on Frontiers so it made it easy to bring these three guys together. Rounding out the band are Magnus Henriksson and Robban Back both from the band Eclipse as well. And a new face to the band with Andreas Passmark (Royal Hunt) will handle the bass duties.

The album was released on January 22, 2021 right slap dab during the COVID pandemic. So, no touring sadly. However, at this point in the pandemic, band’s were still delaying albums and we are so grateful that W.E.T. did not. Their fourth studio album, ‘Retransmission’, sees Erik still at the helm and this time, the guitar is king a little more than it has in the past. But don’t worry, if you are expecting to hear W.E.T., you will in spades as you still get melodic rock, 80’s anthemic AOR and solid music throughout still drenched in keyboards and smothered with great melodies and vocals from the great Jeff Scott Soto. They have become AC/DC in a sort of way with the fact that all the albums sounds the same, but in a very good way. I think people might be upset if they changed their sound, thankfully, they did not. Just punched it up, polished it off and delivered another spectacular release. Let’s see how it holds up.

“Big Boys Don’t Cry” comes screaming out of the gates with its bombastic drums, ear-splitting guitars and as is usually the blueprint, you get both Erik and Jeff on vocals for this first song and it is a scorcher. The melodies and harmonies between the two are better than ever. The anthemic beast of a song shows that W.E.T. have not lost a step in the three years since their last release. They come out swinging with this one.

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Night Ranger – ‘Dawn Patrol’ (1982) – Album Review

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One of my favorite debut albums from a band is ‘Dawn Patrol’ from the band Night Ranger. Most people got in to Night Ranger thanks to either “Sister Christian” or “(You Can Still) Rock in America”, but for me, it was actually their debut album which came out November 1, 1982 and I’m sure I saw the video on MTV as I am not sure how else I would’ve heard of them at that time.

For those that don’t know, Night Ranger is made up of a bunch of extremely talented musicians. The guitar duo of Brad Gillis and Jeff Watson is an unbeatable duo and it almost wasn’t meant to be as Brad was playing with Ozzy Osbourne in 1982 after the tragic death of Randy Rhodes, but he didn’t end up fitting in with the band so he came back to Night Ranger. Kelly Keagy (drums) and Jack Blades (bass) were from a band called Rubicon which also happened to have Brad Gillis in it as well. They then brought in Alan Fitzgerald on keyboards and he came from the band Montrose. The band was complete and what I liked even more was that they had two singers with Kelly and Jack. Kiss had two singers as well and I loved Kiss so I was high on these guys as well for that two singer approach as it gives so much variety to the music.

And the music was great. It was hard rock with a hint of AOR as well. The guitars were immense, the drumming was sensational and the vocals were the best. The keyboards accentuated the music and not over powering it. The debut album was probably the most raw, most intense and the heaviest of that 80’s run which makes it my favorite.

An interesting fact about the band is that they were originally called Ranger and the debut album was printed with that name. Before it was shipped, it was discovered there was a country band called Ranger in California (where Night Ranger is from) and they were worried about getting sued. So, they destroyed all the albums and reprinted them with the new name Night Ranger which was taken from a song on the album. I wonder if any of those Ranger covers ever slipped through and somehow survived as that would be a pretty impressive collectible if so.

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Soto – ‘Revision’ (2020) – Album Review (The Jeff Scott Soto Series)

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During the Covid pandemic, there was no touring, records kept getting delayed and the music industry felt like it was basically shut down. During this time though, some artists stayed creative and Jeff Scott Soto was one of them. He took 10 of his songs and redid them. If you are thinking this is a Bon Jovi ‘This Left Feels Right’ disaster, you would be wrong. It is less a re-imagining of the songs and more of stripping them down to their bare essence. He did everything himself, except for the mixing which he had some friends handle that part such as David Clarkson, John Ellis, and Alessandro Del Vecchio. And I was curious as to what songs he would choose to re-visit and he chose songs that he was the solo writer on and that makes sense as he wouldn’t need approval from anyone else since they were his songs.

The project was originally going to be released as a Jeff Scott Soto solo album, however, there were some legal issues with that maybe because he had just released a solo album a month or two earlier or who knows why. So, Jeff took it his other band, SOTO, and released it under their name. And the release is only available as a digital only release. There is no physical product as of now. Hopefully that will change down the road. I get why he put it under the SOTO moniker so it could get released, but don’t think this is a Metal album at all. This is stripped down, mostly acoustic and slowed down versions of his songs. Nothing metal about them.

The opening track is “Eyes of Love” off his second solo album, ‘Prism’. The original version is a hard rock, melodic ass kicker and here the song his just Jeff and a piano and turned in to a beautiful ballad. Stripping the songs down gives the songs a new chance to shine while really showcasing the power of Jeff’s voice and this is a great way to kick it all off.

The next rack is “My Love, My Friend” which was an a cappella track from Soul Sirkus’ album ‘World Play’ which he did with Neal Schon. He added a drum beat and a piano to it including extra lyrics and more arrangements. It is now a fully flushed out song rather than a short all vocal track. Is it better? It is different and not a bad track. The electronic drum sound hurts it for me. A respectable version for sure, but not a full on knock-out.

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Van Halen – ‘Catch a Rising Star -Live at Pogos Night Club: Wichita, KS April 3, 1978’ – Album Review (Bootleg)

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There is no better feeling than out vinyl digging and find something unexpected like a bootleg. Make that bootleg Van Halen and make there be two different ones there by Van Halen and that is why I love collecting. Those little surprises and this is the first one we will talk about. It is a soundboard recording from April 3, 1978 and recorded at the Pogo’s Night Club and Discotheque in Wichita, Kansas. The show was Pogo’s Catch a Rising Star which was a showcase for up and coming bands in the the 70’s. Van Halen had just released their debut album so you can’t get much more up and coming than that.

This show is David Lee Roth, Michael Anthony, Alex Van Halen and the late, great Eddie Van Halen and man were they young and hungry and this show definitely showcases that hunger. They play almost everything from the debut (minus two songs) and even a cover to end the show. David Lee Roth is in fine form as his banter with the crowd is worth the price of admission alone, but since you get Eddie’s guitar mastery it is icing on the top of the cake. I’m getting excited just talking about. Let’s crank this mutha and get in to the music. The label on the vinyl is pretty cool Some Steampunk guy standing there like he is introducing you to new the rising stars of Van Halen.

SIDE A:

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Jeff Scott Soto – ‘Wide Awake (In My Dreamland)’ (2020) – Album Review (The Jeff Scott Soto Series)

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Jeff Scott Soto keeps cranking out the music whether solo or one of his many projects. This time around we are on Jeff’s 7th Solo album and it as with almost all his solo albums, it is on Frontiers Records. This time around he brought in a staple at Frontiers, Alessandro Del Vecchio, to produce, arrange, mix and master the album. He also helped with the songwriting and instrumentation as well. Wait, is this a Jeff solo album or an Alessandro album with Jeff singing? No, don’t worry, it is a Jeff solo album and that voice is on full display. And if you were around when this came out, you were excited because you were in the midst of the Covid pandemic and happy to get any album as so many bands were constantly delaying their albums in hopes the pandemic would end soon. But not Jeff. He was releasing albums and this one came out on November 6th, 2020.

The rest of the band on this album aside from Jeff and Alessandro was Fabrizio Sgattoni on guitar and damn he can play. Good friend Edu Cominato on drums who is also in Jeff’s band Soto so you know this musicians are top notch. And to make this album even more appealing, there is a bonus disc of Jeff’s digital only release (up to this point) Loud & Live in Milan 2019 which we reviewed last week.

The album opens with a solid rocker called “Someone to Love” and it blasts out of the gate with Soto’s soaring vocals in overdrive. The guitar playing by Frabrizio is to notch and with the accompanying rhythm section that drives the song home, you get a brilliant opener. The song slides in to “Mystified” with Edu slaying the drums and giving us a driving beat throughout. Jeff again sounds great and while the song is another rocker, it is a little forgettable and doesn’t quite go where you think it is. Aside from another killer little guitar solo, the overall song left me a little wanting more as there was no big payoff with the chorus or anything really.

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Kiss – ‘Off the Soundboard: Poughkeepsie, NY Mid-Hudson Civic Arena, November 28, 1984’ (2023) – Album Review

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Kiss has been killing it with live releases and the ‘Off the Soundboard’ Series. It was a brilliant idea for them to take control of their live shows and rather than not make any money with all the bootlegs out there, but to release their own bootleg versions of these shows. This is the 5th one I believe and might be one of the cooler ones they’ve done. It was recorded in Poughkeepsie, NY on November 28, 1984 at the Mid-Hudson Civic Arena. Wait, this is their 5th one, which means there are still 2 I haven’t reviewed yet. I need to get on that. Well, back to this. What makes this one so special? It is because the guitarists on the album is Mark St. John. The band at the time also had original members Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley as well as Peter Criss’ replacement Eric Carr on drums. Now, by this time, Eric is considered a regular and not the new guy anymore. And one of the nicest guys ever.

Mark was hired after they let Vinnie Vincent go because they didn’t feel he deserved the contract that Vinnie thought he deserved and thank goodness they didn’t. Mark recorded the guitars on the ‘Animalize’ album and immediately let the world know this was not the same old Kiss. And with these Kiss songs played live, Mark adds his own flair and isn’t out there to copy anybodies parts. Nope, not at all. This show is Mark doing it his way.

Sadly, Mark had developed reactive arthritis which caused his hands and arms to swell making playing very difficult. He went out on tour with the band and the band also brought along Bruce Kulick to be the back-up guitarist if Mark couldn’t play. It turned out that Mark was only able to play on 3 of the Kiss shows and this was one of them. That’s right, they actually have the recording of one of the shows with Mark and that is what makes this set so cool. I already have a bootleg from this tour, but my show has Bruce on it. I also saw this tour and that show had Bruce in it. That is why I think this set is so freaking cool. Great job Kiss!!

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Needtobreathe – ‘Best of The Insiders: 2nd Edition’ (2023) – Album Review

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For the 2022 Insiders Club, Needtobreathe changed things up. They were no longer going to release a physical product and only do the Digital Songs only. I stopped being a member right then and there as I want a physical product. Well, I think the backlash was swift and loud as a few months in to the year, that all changed. They decided that there will be a new tier level in the Insiders Club, more expensive of course, but a physical product would be given. This time around instead of only a CD, you will get an autographed vinyl copy as well. They still have the digital songs, which are different then the ones on here. The new CD and Vinyl are now a Best of The Insiders giving us the 10 best songs from the 8 years of The Insiders CD series started. The 1st Edition came in March 2023 almost a year after the announcement, but the band was smart as they went ahead and worked on the 2023 Edition at the same time they were working on the 2022 Edition. We received this vinyl in April 2023. We reviewed the 1st Edition last week so now it is time to review the 2nd Edition.

This time around, we only get 9 songs but you have to remember they are trying to fit them on easily on a vinyl with only a set amount of time, so I’m okay with only 9 songs. We did get the CD again which is unsigned bunch of other goodies including a calendar, some magnets of the band members and even a small notebook and a turntable mat. Lots of cool stuff, but nothing more cool than the autographed copy of the vinyl. Like the first one, this is a very limited quantity as it was exclusive to the Insiders Club VIP group which is more expensive so you figure there are fewer people. Let us get to the music, shall we…

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