Reviews - Winter 2011-2012
Rammstein - Concert February 2012
After a Rammstein concert there is simply nowhere else to go. This is a spectacle so mind blowing that one is at a loss to know what else could top it, save another Rammstein concert, or save being on stage with Rammstein which would be perilous...
Bad Religion - The Dissent of Man
It’s a fair testament to their dogged perseverance that these legendary SoCal punks must’ve outlasted just about every spiky-haired teenager they ever inspired to risk life and limb on a skateboard or pester their parents to drop them off at a Warped Tour gig...
Deep Purple - Machine Head
Though not without its moments, 1971’s Fireball described something of a non-descript holding pattern for Deep Purple. Not a bad album as such it was, artistically at least, a curious underachiever compared to In Rock. What they needed was something with as much impact and which delivered them new standards to ensure their upwards path...
Metallica - Master of Puppets
Metallica were formed in 1981 in Los Angeles by guitarist James Hetfield and drummer Lars Ulrich. They were inspired partly by the New Wave of British Heavy Metal (aka NWOBHM) - they've sold over 90 million albums globally and have been instrumental in bringing ‘Thrash’ and ‘Heavy Metal’ music genres into the mainstream...
Argent - Shepherds Bush Empire February 2012
Anyone who remembers Argent from the 70s cites “Hold Your Head Up” and little else from their repertoire, for they have been dormant may years. In fact Argent did not perform as a full band for 36 years until they appeared at London’s High Voltage 2 years ago. That performance was so excellent – outdoors in the heat of the summer - sandwiched between Marillion and Uriah Heep on the Prog Rock stage that I had to get a ticket for this performance at Shepherds Bush...
Love - Forever Changes
Nowadays lauded as one of the most perfect (and influential – can you think of any Northern post-punk bands that haven't name-checked it?) albums of all-time, Forever Changes was, on its release, a flop. The reason for this lies in the fact that, despite being undoubtedly a psychedelic folk album, FC is one of the oddest, most sinister products of the mid 60s West Coast that you’re ever likely to hear...
Fleetwood Mac - Rumours
Rumours by Fleetwood Mac has taken on a life of its own. Selling over 30 million copies world-wide, it has assiduously worked its way into so many households since its release in February 1977 that it's become part of the sonic furniture. It is as much a part of that year's landscape as Never Mind The Bollocks, "I Feel Love" or Saturday Night Fever and arguably the one least tainted by the passage of time...
Pink Floyd - Wish You Were Here
As the follow-up to the Floyd’s iconic, record-breaking 1973 concept album The Dark Side Of The Moon, this album is often unfairly overlooked. With the benefit of hindsight, Wish You Were Here has the same faultless pacing and sequencing of its predecessor, but a more coherent musical narrative, structure and tone, as well as greater lyrical sophistication...
Led Zeppelin - Led Zeppelin IV
Recorded at Headley Grange in Hampshire, Island Studios in London and Sunset Sound in Los Angeles, Led Zeppelin IV is the album that put Led Zeppelin into homes around the world, acting as a successful marriage of the hard rock from their second album with the folkier meanderings of their third. It is an album that demonstrates their subtlety and restraint as much as their stadium-filling grandstanding and it confirmed their superstar rock status...
The Rolling Stones - Exile On Main Street
Like a musical scrapbook chronicling the decay, decadence, excess and torpor of the Stones’ camp, this rough and ready collection of curios, questionable filler, and the occasional flash of blazing brilliance is frequently hailed as one of their best all-time albums. At first glance it’s not easy to see why...
The Doors - L.A. Woman 40th Anniversary Edition
The Doors’ career was a peculiar one. Beginning as a fairly standard Los Angeles RnB and blues band – their cover of Them’s Gloria was always a live highpoint – they entered the national consciousness as a pop group, thanks to the catchiness of singles like Hello, I Love You and the raw brooding unbridled shagnastiness of singer Jim Morrison...
The Ramones - The Ramones
Dumb, crude, three-chord thrash? Yes. Fast, exhilarating and brand new? Yes. Intelligent, boundary smashing and woefully underrated? Definitely. The Ramones were all of these things and more. Like a film’s opening credits their first album contains everything that their later career was to offer, and in 1976 nothing else sounded quite like it...
The New York Dolls - The New York Dolls
Never as bad as the press at the time held them to be, The New York Dolls are probably the point where style definitely won over substance. Their influence can be felt just as much in their dress sense and openly dysfunctional behaviour as in their sometimes questionable musical output. But that doesn’t stop their debut album being one of the most visceral, thrilling rides ever released...
Ian Dury - New Boots and Panties!!
It’s a wonderful irony that the two lyricists who most embodied punk’s libertarian role in helping banish the last vestiges of straight-laced Victorian values in the mid-70s were the two who most resembled a Dickensian nightmare. Johnny Rotten and Ian Dury both sought release from a social system designed to keep working class oiks like them in their place, and although one approached the task through head-on confrontation and the other with art school nuance, the message was the same: Think For Yourself...
Saxon Live at Koko - December 2011
Saxon was on perfect form as they played their last gig of the year and their last CALL TO ARMS tour date at London’s Koko just before Christmas. The band was on top form despite having been on a gruelling journey covering multiple countries and cities. As if not strenuous enough, lead singer Biff Byford took a 2 day ‘break’ between gigs flying Helsinki to San Francisco to perform with Metallica at their 30th Anniversary concert...
Iggy Pop - King Biscuit Flower Hour Presents...
When Iggy Pop comes to town my wife gets a strange gleam in her eye. To see him live is to love him. He is a man possessed, wriggling like an eel shot through with 2000 volts of naked electricity. The stage is his kingdom and he rocks like no one else...
Lou Reed - Transformer
A useful indicator of Lou Reed’s raw talent is a quick look at his inability to derail his own solo career. From the not untimely death of The Velvet Underground, featuring him as singer, in 1970 onwards, this native New Yorker has seemed intent on poking a stick through the spokes of his push bike at every given opportunity. His musical choices often rank between the bewildering and the outright irritating...
David Bowie - Black Tie White Noise
In 1993 there was little reason to expect that David Bowie might make a decent record. He’d just given the world, unasked, the sludgy group rock of Tin Machine, which had done nothing to cleanse the listener’s palate after his 80s solo albums, which reached their nadir with 1987’s Never Let Me Down...
