SPV\/Playground<\/p>\n
MAGNUM formed as a house band of a night club in Birmingham in the early seventies. Quite some house band, as the nucleus of vocalist Bob Catley and guitarist Tony \u201cThe Hat\u201d Clarkin still remains intact. Keyboard player Mark Stanway has been around since 1979, while Al Barrow, bass, joined in 2001, and Harry James (of TERRAPLANE\/THUNDER fame) was added around that time too. The millennium was a time of hardship for the band, that was defunked for a while. But reformation came and along with it their comeback album \u201cBreath of Life\u201d. It was in turn followed by four more, if you count the almost new \u201cThe Visitation\u201d. That brings us back to now, as MAGNUM release their 16th studio album. Can they return to form, or are they relying on former glories?<\/p>\n
Opener \u201cAll the Dreamers\u201d is an odd choice to me, It\u00b4s over seven minutes long, and though it has many of the bands principal features it is too slow to latch on. Unfortunately I feel the same after both \u201cBlood Red Laughter\u201d, a tired take on the bands successes, and \u201cDidn\u00b4t Like You Anyway\u201d. The title track quickens the pace and is definitely a move in the right direction. The same goes for the slightly depressed but still more lively \u201cBroken Promises\u201d and the somewhat snappy \u201cSee How they Fail\u201d. But the rough edges of \u201cDance of the Black Tattoo\u201d is not well suited to the band name, and of the remaining tracks only \u201cShadow Town\u201d is close enough to the MAGNUM I love. I wasn\u00b4t expecting a new \u201cOn a Storyteller\u00b4s Night\u201d, but I wanted something more positive than this. It may be a solid musicianship, but a bit of heart and soul is missing. So I guess they\u00b4re neither living in the past or returning to to big deeds.<\/p>\n
Track List
\nAll the Dreamers
\nBlood Red Laughter
\nDidn\u00b4t Like You Anyway
\nOn the 13th Day
\nSo Let it Rain
\nDance of the Black Tattoo
\nShadow Town
\nPutting Things in Place
\nBroken Promises
\nSee How They Fail
\nFrom Within<\/p>\n
www.spv.de www.magnumonline.co.uk <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
SPV\/Playground MAGNUM formed as a house band of a night club in Birmingham in the early seventies. Quite some house band, as the nucleus of vocalist Bob Catley and guitarist Tony \u201cThe Hat\u201d Clarkin still remains intact. Keyboard player Mark Stanway has been around since 1979, while Al Barrow, bass, joined in 2001, and Harry […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":120,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2039","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cd_reviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.livestagemusic.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2039","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.livestagemusic.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.livestagemusic.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.livestagemusic.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/120"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.livestagemusic.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2039"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.livestagemusic.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2039\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.livestagemusic.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2039"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.livestagemusic.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2039"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.livestagemusic.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2039"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}