REVIEWS FROM MY VINYL COLLECTION

Day: December 7, 2022

JOHN NORUM – Face The Truth

This is the second solo album from the Europe axeman, and was released back in ’92. It’s more of a full on rock album than his first, and sees Glenn Hughes singing on several tracks. One of these is opener Face The Truth, a superb heavy blues groove with a killer vocal and superb solo. Night Buzz is more of an LA eighties glam groover with a nice riff and hook, and a ripping solo. Interesting to hear how Glenn’s voice has changed over the past thirty years since this was recorded. Third track in and it’s ballad time with In Your Eyes. Normal service is resumed with Opium Trail a cover of the Thin Lizzy tune. A great homage to a great tune with John handling lead vocals. Side 1 closes out with We Will Be Strong ,which sees John’s band mate Joey Tempest on vocals and it’s also ballad number two.

Side 2 kicks off with Good Man Shining, another heavy blues groover which reminds a little of Whitesnake. Then it’s, Time Will Find An Answer. A great opening guitar solo that leads into a gallop groove. I love the main riff. Counting On Your Love is a straight up melodic rock groover with a great hook and chorus. Enidca is the only instrumental on the album and this is where John really let’s it rip, not in a total shred fest but with a lot of melody and feel. Still The Night was written by Hughes and Thrall, I think for what was to be their follow-up album and it definitely has that groove. We close out the album with Distant Voices, a fast uptempo rocker and my favourite on the album.

8.5/10 from The Grooveman.

KIX – Cool Kids

This is the band’s follow-up to their hugely entertaining debut, and was released back in ’83. Change was already afoot as original guitarist Ronnie Younkins was replaced by Brad Divens, and that energetic archaic approach was being smoothed out to a more corporate sound, which would pay dividends with the Blow My Fuse album.

The more basic AC/DC sound was becoming more prevalent with tracks like Love Pollution and Get Your Monkeys Out, which is fine, but tracks like Body Talk and Loco Emotion just fail miserably as they do not sound like the band at all and sounds more new wave. Thankfully there are redeeming tracks like Mighty Mouth, which is just kick ass rock n’ roll and more of what the band are all about. The last track Restless Blood feels more like the energy of the first album and is my favourite track.

7.5/10 from The Grooveman.