Posted in Cd Reviews

Alfonzetti takes its name from singer Matti Alfonzetti who has plenty of experience, having been in several bands including Jagged Edge, Heavy Waters, Skintrade and Bam bam boys. This is pretty much a solo album – the album is very much a work of just two men – Matti Alfonzetti and Daniel Flores. Between them they play all the instruments apart from some lead guitar parts where guest musicians including Marcus Jidell from Evergrey make an appearance. In addition, Alfonzetti wrote and produced all the tracks, and Flores mixed and co-produced them.

For me the best track by far on the album is the last track – ”I will never let you fall”. Heavier than the other tracks, it’s the only time Alfonzetti’s voice shows a bit of power and the heavy guitar riffs make this a very good track.

Some n...

Posted in Cd Reviews

Market Square/Border

Gull Records may not have a ring these days, but they were an interesting indie company in the seventies. If I say that JUDAS PRIEST was on their roster things might clear up. In 1972 vocalist/keyboards/synth etc man Ken Elliott hooked up with drummer/percussionist/xylophonist etc. Kieran O ´Connor. Their aim was to form a band featuring only tangents and drums, no more personnel and no touring. Their focus is very clear from the instrumental opener “Sky Scraper” onwards on their 1974 debut. Ken was then, as well as now, a session musician and a score maker, but the lust to create music was too strong. In the approximately four years the band existed the number of musicians involved grew steadily, from two up to eleven on the follow up “psi-fi”...

Posted in Cd Reviews

Roadrunner/Warner

RUSH is a time machine! Few bands have been around for so long in intact form. Save one drummer change in 1974, the band has always been around Geddy Lee, bass/vocals, Alex Lifeson, guitars and Neil Peart, drums. Their influence on a wide variety of bands, from virtuosos like DREAM THEATER to METALLICA, has been universally known for long. I wonder if they had the faintest idea of the magnitude they were to achieve when they were still struggling in the early seventies...

Posted in Gig/Festival Reviews

Day 01
So this was the first edition I attended to this festival which is also organised by SWR inc. the same organization that arranges and manages the Steel Warriors Rebellion Fest every April.
The Festival took place in an old cinema inside a Mall in the center of the city Braga (North of Portugal); there were two stages (as in SWR Fest), one called “+” for the most loud and extreme bands and the other called “-“ for things more melodic and doomish. The bar of the cinema was used for beverages and was a food stand was placed nearby (something that was missing in the last edition so I’ve heard), after the concert there was an after party with some Dj’s.
In terms of sound, I think was very decent and clear, since this was and old cinema there werent any kind of echos or bounc...

Posted in Interviews

Festivalphoto spoke to Michael Monroe and Dregen before their performance at Hard Rock Hell 2011.

Festivalphoto: You’re famous for your energetic live shows which are great fun to watch as you climb onto speakers (or anything else convenient) or throw yourself into the crowd. Do you ever get injured doing this?

Michael: Oh yeah, a lot. I broke two ribs twice last year, I’ve broken my ankle twice, yeah I do get injuries but I try to be careful.

Festivalphoto: With your habit of swinging your microphone and its stand around on stage do you ever injure your band mates?

Michael: No – only myself.

Festivalphoto: In Birmingham I seem to remember Steve Conte bleeding after taking a Saxophone to the face.

Michael: He walked into the Sax, it wasn’t me (laughing)

Festivalphoto: Good answer

Fes...

Posted in Interviews

Upon receiving a recommendation from a friend, I visited Syne’s official website at http://www.syne.it/ and listened to the songs featured in the media section. Being pleasantly surprised by what I heard, I had a chat with the band’s mastermind, Fabio “FaZ” Marchisio, to find out more about this fresh Italian band with a lot of potential, and below you can read the result. And once you’re done reading, you should pay a visit to their website and listen for yourself.

Can I get a little history of the band. How did it start, how did you meet all the members? What does the name mean?
This projects started at very beginning of 2010. I had a bunch of songs and lyrics and I was trying to contact potential musicians on the scene to join the band and to learn the songs I had...

Posted in Cd Reviews

This mini-album features seven cover versions plus a couple of acoustic versions of songs from Houston’s debut album. The CD inlay seems to imply that its a 7 song mini album with two ”bonus” tracks as the acoustic songs are credited separately which seems kind of pointless to be honest, but it’s not a big deal.

The cover versions are:

Runaway – originally recorded by Dakota
Carrie – originally recorded by Michael Bolton
Brief Encounter – originally recorded by Airrace and featuring Airrace’s Laurie Mansworth on guest guitar
Don’t You Know What Love Is (originally recorded by Touch and featuring Touch keyboard player Mark Mangold on guest vocals
Don’t Ever Wanna Lose You – originally recorded by New England
Didn’t We Almost Win It All – originally recorded by the late Laura Branigan...

Posted in Cd Reviews

This is the special edition of Amaranthe’s debut album, released several months after the original release of the album. So what’s the difference between this and the standard edition? Well for a start there are two extra songs on this version, and secondly there is a DVD included with music videos, behind the scenes footage and a tour documentary.

If you havent heard anything by Amaranthe yet then you’ve definitely been missing out. A quick glance at the photo on the cover might give the impression that this is a typical female fronted band, but nothing could be further from the truth. Amaranthe are probably unique in having three lead vocalists – two lead singers doing clean vocals – one male and one female, with another male singer doing the screams and growls...

Posted in Gig/Festival Reviews

A one. A two A Fuck You! -Lips

Kultförklarade kanadensiska Anvil öppnar överraskande och oväntat bara tio minuter efter att usla förbandet Crimes Of Passion slutat plåga oss. Belysningen hann inte ens dämpas inne på KB! Lips var så ivrig att komma igång. Den fullständigt galna Lips springer ivrigt rundor på scenen själv och kör lite solo, skriker i micken på gitarren och är helt överväldigad av att få spela inför de skånska fansen inne på KB.

När väl övriga medlemmar kommer in på scenen och kör igång så visar läder-piraten Robb Reiner på fantastiskt livligt trumspel. Basisten Glenn Five, medlem sedan femton år tillbaka är riktigt cool och ger djup till bandet...

Posted in Gig/Festival Reviews

Saxon har en otroligt hög lägsta nivå och denna kväll ville Saxon inte vara sämre än bra, riktigt bra vill säga, utan körde på för fulla muggar och levererade hits efter hits med mycket inlevelse. Efter nästan två timmars dunder och brak kände man sig överkörd efter att fått höra hits från större delen av deras karriär. Tisdagskvällen på KB var som en fredag! Lokalen var fullsmockad och folk drack som om det vore helg.

60-åringen Biff Byford (sång) är ett energiknippe i sällan skådat slag. Han är en imponerande herre som fört Saxon framåt år efter år. Han headbangar smått och hoppade så mycket att energin smittade av sig till publiken...