Welcome one and all to episode 408 of Signals
from Mars. I'm your host Victor. Jeremy Weltman
joins me today for our monthly new releases recap.
That's right, we're going to be going over new
albums that were released in February of 2025.
This is for all you people that want to keep
up with what's new, what's fresh, what's up.
I'm ready. Let's do it. redundant because you
already know that this is for all you people
that say that there's no good new music coming
out. February was an exceptionally good month
for new hard rock and metal. Yeah, we don't cover
absolutely everything. We cover things that stick
out to us, things that jump out at us. And I'm
going to be honest, there are certain genres
or sub genres that I don't get into as much as
others. If I see some, band that i know of or
a band that i've posted on patreon then i'll
check their album out especially if it's a song
that i enjoy if there's a label that kind of
stands out to me and they usually release things
that are um in the neighborhood of what i enjoy
then i'll check that out as well it isn't a uh
and there are things that we miss, definitely.
There are things that I see on other sites that
I go back and check out anyway. But I think it's
a good start. And on the website, I do post a
lot of the albums, or not a lot of the albums,
I post a list with all of the albums that we
do discuss, plus the additional albums that I
do mention. During the episode. So you can go
there to check all that great stuff out. But
I think we've, we've got you covered there. There
really shouldn't be any type of confusion as
to, Hey, is there anything cool that's come out?
Is there anything, ah, there isn't anything,
you know, there hasn't been anything since 89
that I like, you know, I was living my best life
back then. I haven't progressed past high school.
So, whatever. And if that's you, I'm sorry. If
not, open your mind, motherfucker, and check
out some new music. Real quickly, I want to send
a shout out to my patrons, Pascal Schomacher,
Sean Richman, Chris Sinzak, Tony Espin, Anthony
Mackey, Ed Ferguson, Johan Edestrum, Metal Dan,
Jose Ruiz, Chris Vaglio, Gabriel Ruiz, Brad Dahl,
Mike Jones, Jeremy Weltman, who's on this episode,
Steve Hoker, and Steven Saylor. Thank you, all
you guys, for your support. Remember to go to
signalsfrommars .com for all of your one -stop
shopping when it comes to keeping up with the
podcast, the live stream, merch. Patreon, anything
you can do to help us out. And I say this all
the time. It doesn't necessarily have to be plopping
money down for the Patreon or for a cool t -shirt,
although it is very appreciated. There's PayPal
donations. There's the whole buy me a coffee
slash buy me a pizza route. There's using our
Amazon links to pick different things up. Yes,
we are, or I am an Amazon associate. So I got
a certain kickback. If you, Make a purchase through
them using my links. You can also share this
on social media. Check out some of the 30 second
shorts that I've been posting with hard rock
and metal trivia. And yeah, thanks for listening
to this episode. There's a million other podcasts
out there that you can be listening to. There's
a million other shows you can be watching, but
I appreciate that you are here listening to this
show. And I hope you share it with a friend.
And I hope that it makes your day better. That
if you're having a shit day, you turn this on,
you laugh with us a little, you argue with us
a little, and you're just flat out entertained.
Let's get on with the episode, folks. Welcome
one and all to the latest episode of Signals
from Mars. I'm your host, Victor. And joining
me tonight is Mr. Jeremy Weltman. Jeremy, how
are you? Yeah, good. Thanks, Victor. I was really
enjoying your music tonight. I always enjoy it.
But, you know, the intro music, it's excellent.
Just remind us who actually did that, because
I can't remember. Was it you? That would be me.
um i don't know sometimes i hear that and i'm
like wow this sounds so pedestrian this sounds
so amateurish and there are other times i'm like
yeah this is great you know so uh there's sometimes
mixed emotions about that stuff but still cool
nonetheless um so yes we're back for another
Albums countdown. Not albums countdown. This
is what happens when you do two things at once.
We're back for the review of new albums that
were released in January. No, in February 2025.
We are in March, and I am fumbling all over the
place. Anyway, thank you for joining us. And
there's a lot of excellent music to talk about
tonight. which is what we shall be doing. And
on February 7th, we had a bunch of big name releases
here. So we had new albums from Dream Theater,
Ginger, Thundermother, Obscura, Marco, Hitala,
who's best known for his work in Nightwish, and
I'm probably pronouncing his last name wrong,
sorry. Chris Harms, first solo album, singer
of Lord of the Lost, who gets a lot of love here.
Black 44, Days of Jupiter, Midlife Crisis, Saber,
Pathogenic, Frenolith, Open Casket, Unrequited,
The Defect, Fuzz, Populi. a reissue from Sabre,
their album Without Warning, and a live album
from Plush called Live USA 24. Jeremy, what did
you listen to? Yeah, I thought it was a fairly
interesting mix of releases, really, to kick
off February. I really enjoyed the good time
rock and roll of Thunder Mother. I described,
you know, it's really the Swedish girl school.
Dirty and Divine, studio album number six now.
And I guess you kind of know what, you know,
what sort of music this band is. It doesn't really
require a lot of analysis. It's very upfront.
It's in your face, old school, hard rock, you
know, a fair few references to ACDC there. You
know, I would question, is it indispensable?
Is it a must pick? No. But of course, not everything
that, you know, you enjoy is. But what I would
say, you know, it's built on strong foundations.
It's in that great hard rock tradition. It has
very good hooks to the music. Very decent singer,
very strong production. And if I might add, it's
a band, you know, I'd be. really happy to see
live for sure. So, you know, that was a really
good start to the week, to the month. Thunder
Mother, really good. I moved on to Black 44 with
an album called Bloodlines. This time it's the,
you know, the band from Finland playing stoner
and southern influenced metal. It seems as if
they sort of released an album, you know, a decade
ago now, and now this one. You know, I'm not
that familiar with the band. Maybe because, you
know, they don't release everything so often.
So I can't really comment, you know, what's going
on in the band or, you know, why they spent so
long releasing stuff. But in any event, it was
a real enjoyable listen. Plenty of grooves from
the off, you know, couched in sort of metal -y
undertones, semi -growly vocals. Excuse me. You
can really hear what's being sung. There's also
some very tight riffs on the song The Kingdom.
And, you know, it sort of morphs into a bit of
a sort of Guns N' Roses style epic, I thought,
that song. So, yeah, I enjoyed that one as well.
That was good. I also listened to the new Dream
Theater album, Parisomnia. As we know, it's a
concept album about sleep and dreams. I've never
really fully bought into this band, I must say.
They're a little bit proggy at times for my liking,
but they are excellent musicians. I would admit
that. Often they desire to experiment. They play
around various chord structures, as we know,
and scales that can leave the listener probably
a little bit cold at times. Again, it was here
with the lengthier songs, Broken Man, Dead Asleep.
the Shadow Man incident, none of which I must
admit I can recall now. You know, they're so
complex. But having said that, I did find some
joy on the album. You know, the excellent song
Midnight Messiah, Are We Dreaming, Bend the Clock.
You know, so it was a real mixed bag, which is
what I find with Dream Theater a lot. So I'll
just leave that one there. So really, I guess
my album of the week is The World Was Never Enough
by Days of Jupiter. This is the Swedish melodic
metal band. You know, it is a touch generic at
times, but it's a quality release. It's got very
good production. I particularly like the ballad
Desolation. I thought that was a real classic
song with sort of super guitar weaving in and
out. Amazing vocals from Jan or Jan Hilley, who
really adds something to the band, I think. The
fix that follows is sort of more full on with
sort of gothic overtones. There are lots of other
heavier songs that are quite multi -layered on
the album. And, you know, for sort of a modern
sounding record, which to be honest, isn't always
my bag. I thought it was a really good listen.
So that's my album of the week. Okay, cool. I
listened to a few different albums as well. I
did get a chance to listen to the Dream Theater.
Midnight Messiah is by far my favorite song off
of the album. It is a really good song. And I
think that the singles are all... Pretty good.
The thing is that, much like you, I'm not a huge
prog metal fan, so it just doesn't work for me
after a while. I did get to listen to the new
Ginger album, Duel, which I really like Ginger,
but at this point, this is album four or five.
It's just more of the same. where it started
wearing on me with their previous album. And
now this album is, it doesn't suck, but I've
heard all this already. You know, it would be
as if Judas Priest put out British Steel five
straight albums. You know, you'd get kind of
turned off by it. I did listen to the Chris Harms
1980 album. It is okay. It is much more in the
vein of 80s synth wave. It is all right. It really
has little to do with hard rock or metal. But
I'm going to go with Lost in Flames from the
LA band Sabre. Sabre is a band that very lo -fi,
80s -influenced heavy metal. And if you're into...
uh, mid eighties, like bordering between you
wobble. And when glam metal became the thing,
that sort of pocket in the middle where bands
were trying to figure things out, they were still
being a little high and dry deaf leopard. They
were still being a little priest, a little maiden
without getting too far into the LA stuff. Um,
that's kind of where saber resides to me. and
there's nothing new on this album, but it is
entertaining, and I think for anyone that's into
anything remotely close to that, I think that
it's worth a listen, definitely. We have a few
people in the chat tonight. We have Mr. Brad
Dahl sending his cheers. Brad, glad that you
joined us. We have, joining us early on today,
Mr. Edgar Winterson. Edgar's saying that Jeremy
is a Dream Theater hater. And Brad actually just
saw Dream Theater Live. Brad, what would be easier
for you to step into? Playing with Kansas or
playing with Dream Theater? Which of the two?
So, all right. So I'm going to throw in our first
question of the night. We started this with a
previous episode. All right. The question is,
what's the album that made you fall in love with
hard rock or metal? Was it a classic, a deep
cut, or something unexpected? All right. Chime
in, folks, as Jeremy and I move on to the next
week here. If I can pull my Excel back up. Here
we go. All right. February 14th. New albums by
Lacuna Coil, Crazy Licks. Hangman's Chair, Dynasty,
I guess how you pronounce it, Twisted, Scorpion
Child, Mantar, Love is Noise, Spiders, Diamond
Dogs and Speeding Chris, I guess is the name,
Lone Shark, Bleeding Through, Ginger Evil, Mantric
Moment, Savage Lands, Sixth Sense. War Lung,
EP from Raven, and that's it for the 14th Valentine's
Day. Jeremy, what did you listen to? Yeah, I
actually did listen to the Raven EP, but I'm
not going to review that because obviously we
go through albums, but it was typical Raven.
I went really fairly old school with the three
albums that I'm going to mention now. First up,
Game of Faces by... yeah dynasty it could be
dynasty or probably dynasty uh yeah swedish band
on the block there as always uh but definitely
not one of the best i'm afraid um you know there's
bags of melody on here they have a real decent
singer also good production as normal but it's
all a bit like abber on speed it's um you know
some of the songs do sound a little bit like
heat uh i guess but they're fairly poppy and
you know nothing very memorable so you know i
wasn't too too favoured by that one. But the
better album really was No Sins to Confess by
Lone Shark, which has a carefully placed umlat
over the ow, over the o, not the ow. Yeah, for
some strange reason. A band from Finland, but
they might as well be from Newcastle, England,
because they're a band steeped in New Auburn,
really. And to be honest, that's what really
makes them fairly appealing to me. Yeah, sure,
they're fairly unrefined as a bag of unrefined
sugar is, but they're just as sweet with guitars
that attack. The big letdown is really having
a singer that can only just sing, though. But
hey, you know, no one ever complained about Jess
Cox of Tigers of Pantang, the late Paul D 'Anno.
or scores of other new album singers, you know,
that could only just make it. So, yeah, sit back,
transport yourself back to 1980 and enjoy the
raw power of Loneshot. But it wasn't my pick
of the week. I tried Thrill of the Bite by Swedish
band Crazy Licks. They've been going, as you
know, a little while now with their sort of,
you know, pure 80s style sleaze, glam, hard rock
crossover, whatever you want to call it. And
to be honest, it isn't bad at all. You know,
there's some great hooks on it. You can't help
feeling, you know, they hadn't copied a style.
And, you know, when they were young, they would
have, you know, if they emerged in the 80s, it
would have been a real big thing, probably. And
I also reckon this band would be really good
to see live. So, yeah, for me, Thrill of the
Bite by Crazy Licks is my album, Louis. All right.
One quick correction, Jeremy. Okay. Lone Shark
is from Spain. Right. Okay. I didn't realize
that. I thought they were from Finland. Right.
Okay. So there is a Finnish loan shark, but the
one with the lots over the O is from Barcelona.
Oh, right. Okay. Thanks for that. Yeah. So there
you go. All right. So I listened to, let's see,
I listened to Scorpion Child. I saw the end as
it passed through me, which Brad has just mentioned
that. that uh he actually purchased i listened
to twisted's uh welcome to your funeral listen
to hangman chair sedition uh i have to say actually
real quickly here the scorpion child if you're
looking for something that's new album influence
i would recommend it the twisted is um More of
modern hard rock, something that could border
on getting radio play. The one video that I posted
on Patreon reminded me of one of the last two
Ozzy albums. Interesting note that Todd Latore
of Queensryche, the lead singer, plays drums
on the album. So there is that. Hangman's Chair.
There are songs of theirs from the French band
that I've enjoyed in the past, but the album
just gets kind of samesy to me. It just sounds
like one long song, unfortunately. For me, Sleepless
Empire by Lacuna Coyle is my pick of the week.
I have had this album since about the beginning
of the year. I know that not everyone that listens
to what we do here. enjoys them. I've been a
fan for quite a long time. And what I like about
this album is that they get heavier and at the
same time they reintroduce things that they've
done in the past where they've tried certain
melodies or maybe bringing in a more of a pop
-ish element at times and here it works because
it mixes with the heaviness. It isn't like in
the past. with like shadow life i believe is
the name of the album it has the um glass grenade
on the cover where it's just full -on pop almost
where it's uh like anthony mackie would call
the eurovision metal and um i don't think that
this band needs to do that they are like i said
they've gone in a heavier direction with the
album and at the same time added other elements
that kind of propel this in a different direction.
So. All right. Brad is saying, let's see. Lone
shark reminds me a bit of riot. Crazy licks also
doesn't hit hard for me. And saw a bit of scorpion
child last year, opening for Saxon in Austin,
Texas. They were really good. All right. So let's
see here. Real quickly, Jeremy, since no one
has chimed in in the chat, what's the album that
made you fall in love with hard rock or metal?
Yeah, it's a very easy one for me. It was Physical
Graffiti by Led Zeppelin because it was probably
in my time of dying in Kashmir, those sort of
songs were quite, you know, on the heavier side
for Zeppelin. Uh, you know, I heard them very
early before I even heard, you know, British
steel or wheels of steel. So yeah, that'd be
for me. That's it. Yeah. And cashmere. Uh, I
mean, that's my brother had Led Zeppelin four
first, and then he got physical graffiti and
Led Zeppelin four blew my mind. And when we got
to physical graffiti, physical graffiti has a
lot of music on it and it has varying music.
So there's a lot of different music. There's
a big, long musical journey for you on that.
And at the end of side one is cashmere. And I
remember the first time listening to that and
being, what is, what is this? You know, with
just the, Arabic feel to it and all that, that
was all very new to me. Um, and that's why I
think there's some like Arabic influenced music
and stuff that I've always enjoyed because Zeppelin
did a lot of that same stuff. And, um, and I,
and I remember people saying to me, Oh, you know,
I can't get into this. You know, I don't like
this sort of music. I'm like right up my alley,
you know? Um, Oh, wow. Cashmere by far the worst.
The worst Zeppelin song. We don't need strings
in a Zeppelin song. So you're telling me, Edgar,
that cashmere is worse than hot dog or carousel?
There we go. So Brad finally has jumped on in.
Johnny Winner's second winner probably set me
on my rock path. Edgar plays on it, plays a bit
on it. There you go. I fucking love Hot Dog and
Carousel. We all like different things. Hot Dog.
One man's music is another man's noise. Yeah,
there you go. One man's trash is another man's
gold. Yeah, they only come out at night was great.
Okay. For me, I remember touching. I was four.
And that set me on my musical path that destroyed
me for life. So, all right, let's move on to
February 21st. We had new albums from kill switch
engage scour, which is one of Philly and Salmo's
side projects. That's his death metal side project.
I would. Imagine that Ed Ferguson will be voting
for that on his top 10 albums of the year. Let's
see. Jason Buehler and Baron Von Buehler's Orchestra.
Manor Womb. Vulture Vengeance. Morax. Air Force.
Abduction. Traitors. Katerina Nicole. Ellis Manoband.
The 7th Guild. Twins Crew, Nachblut, I guess,
how do you pronounce that? Retromorphosis, Silos,
Sacrifice, EPs from The Dark and God Complex,
and a new live album by Dirty Honey called Mayhem
and Revelry. And we also got the Warner recordings,
1985 through 1994, from David Lee Roth. So I
actually have two copies of Edelman Smile on
vinyl, have several copies on CD as well, English
and Spanish, and also have it on cassette somewhere.
So as interesting as that might be, I love Edelman
Smile. I think Skyscraper. I think Skyscraper.
is underrated because a lot of people get stuck
on Just Like Paradise. But there's other really
good songs off of that, like Hot Dog and a Shake
and Stand Up and Knuckle Bones. I think it's
a solid album. It gets a bad rap. The third album,
A Little Ain't Enough, which features Jason Becker.
Isn't bad either. The title track is really good.
Hammerhead shark is good on fire and fire or
babies on fire. Is that what it's called? I don't
remember. There's a few good songs off of that.
Showtime is actually on that as well. And after
that, I mean, you're dirty little mouth. I'm
not a fan of the funky monkey or whatever the
hell the name of that song was just off to me
anyway. Jeremy, what did you listen to for the
week of February 21st? Yeah, I agree with you,
by the way, on the early Dave albums. They're
really great. Yeah, this week I delved into the
new Air Force album, Acts of Madness. It's a
band that features the old -timer Doug Samson,
of course, who trades on his brief spell in Iron
Maiden. I saw these guys actually last year supporting
Raven, Alcatraz and Girl School on a sort of
New Auburn night, and they were very entertaining
too. And the lead singer, Lino, he's a Portuguese
guy. He sounds really like Bruce Dickinson. In
fact, I actually mentioned to him in the toilets
during the interval that he could actually get
the Maiden job when Bruce retires, and he sort
of laughed at me. But I actually honestly meant
it because, you know, he does sound like him.
And in fact, the band, you know, as you know,
they sound a little bit like Maiden as well,
but probably with chunkier riffs. You know, they're
not as, what's the word? They're not as refined
as Maiden are. But, you know, even if they're
not the same quality, you know, they have some
old school metal and it's a perfectly fine listen.
But I also thought this particular week I'd try
out some death metal thrash for Ed. And in this
week, I enjoyed the sledgehammer riffing of the
German band Traitor with the album Phobias. Sure,
it wasn't something, you know, I'd listened to
in its entirety, but it had its moments of angst
and anguish. And I thought, you know, I'd mentioned
it because, you know, you've got a varied group
of listeners on these channels, Victor. So it's
good to get something a bit different out there.
And also, I'd had a bit of a heavy day with work,
and it was really great to blast out something
very noisy, which we like to do from time to
time. So, yeah, it did the trick for a day. My
pick of the week, though, was a real unexpected
pleasure, really, for a power metal fan like
me. I mean, Chapter 4 by the strangely named
Twins Crew. I think I've got this one right.
I'm sure they're from Sweden. It's actually really
good. Obviously, Chapter 4 means it's their fourth
full -length release, obviously, and I haven't
heard them before, to be honest. But what they've
done is they keep it fairly heavy enough to appeal
to metal fans rather than go down the sort of
pop route, which a lot of bands fall down that
sort of trap, really. I'll admit the singer struggles
a bit occasionally with some of it. And I know
it's not your bag as well, Victor, but not everything
has to be a five -star album to be enjoyable.
And what I say is I enjoyed it, so I'm going
to pick it as my album of the week. Okay. All
right. So I listened to – it would be good if
I didn't close the Excel sheet on myself here.
I listened to – The Amulet from Morox. It sounds
like full -on 80s heavy metal. Listen to Vulture's
Vengeance. Their album is called Dust Age. Starts
off with a real thrashy song and then kind of
goes back to just being full -on heavy metal.
Listen to Jason Buehler and the Baron Von Bielski's
Orchestra. The Escapologist is the name of the
album. And it's not bad. It's proggy at times.
It's poppy at times. It's a little of everything.
It's okay. For me, though, my album of the week
is This Consequence from Killswitch Engage, another
album that I've had for quite some time now.
I know that diehards are... annoyed at this album
because they say it's too polished they say it's
too clean they say it's them selling out i think
it sounds great i like a lot of the hooks that
it has um i like the fact that adam d is singing
clean on the backing vocals on a lot of songs
i mean he usually does guttural backing vocals
and there's still plenty of that here but i like
the um the clean direction so All right, second
question here of the night. Let me post it on
here. All right, if you could bring back one
metal musician for one more album or tour, who
would it be and why? Would it be a legendary
frontman, a guitar god, or an underrated icon?
Jeremy, who would that be for you? Well, I guess
if we can include dead people, then I'm definitely
going to say Dio because I've seen him live several
times, and I just want to see him again because
he's a master. Yeah, and imagine if he was turning
up at Ozzy's gig in Villa Park, and he'd probably
steal the show, unfortunately. You imagine that
they roll out the Dio hologram for that night?
Yeah. Yeah, Sharon. Sharon going, no, no, it
wasn't supposed to be like this. She'd have them
throw eggs at it. I was going to say Dio as well.
Oh, okay. But I would say this. I'd love to have
him back to do another Sabbath album. Yeah, yeah.
That would be my thing. Let's see. Ed is, Ed,
yeah. Brad is saying Eddie Van Halen, obvious
reasons. Makes me think. Should I have said Randy
Rhodes? No, should I have said Kevin Dubrow?
How about that one, Brad? Yeah, Eddie is also.
I don't think you could go wrong with that either.
All right. Let's move it along. This is the final
week of February. This is the one that I've been
waiting to discuss since January. So February
28th, we had new albums from Robin McCauley,
Dirk Snyder, Architects, Hyrax, Arion, Avantasia.
Chemicide, Perfect Plan, Oversize, U -Infinite,
Bronco, Year of the Cobra, Sepul... Sepul...
Troll Curse? Wow, I don't know how to pronounce
that. Grave Infestation, Brainstorm, Dark Chapel.
Enemy Inside, Grima, The Residents, Vacuous,
Venomorous, Reissues from Bon Jovi, Slippery
When Wet, and Vision of Disorder with their self
-titled debut album. Jeremy, what did you listen
to? Yeah, I think metal bands need to come up
with a name one day which doesn't have any vowels
in which you are not going to be able to pronounce.
Oh, yeah, of course. I'm sure there's some death
metal band that already does it. It's going to
happen, isn't it? So for the final week, yeah,
I listened to Dirk Schneider. I listened to the
revisiting Balls to the Wall. I mean, you know,
it's going to be great. I'm going to see the
band performing it live, you know, on the Saxon
tour in November. And it is an album, you know,
I mostly like, bar the odd sort of turgid song
on it. I must admit, you know, not every song
is fantastic on it. But really the re -records
are not for me. I mean, I want to see it live,
but I don't want to see, you know, bands making
their original albums worse. And I think this
is, you know. I don't like the fact they have
a guest singer on every song. I just want to
hear Udo singing it. That's just me. It doesn't
work. Full stop. So I listen to Light That Burns
the Sky by Arion. We've mentioned the band before.
Symphonic style metal band from Finland. I have
the last album, Vultures Die Alone. I think they
released it back in 2021, I think. You know,
I enjoyed that album. I thought it was, you know,
it's a decent listen, but it's not a band I want
to listen to a lot of all the time. I think they're
a bit samey. And, you know, this one has its
moments, but again, overall, it's, you know,
a little bit the same. So that's definitely not
my album of the week. The same could be said
of the melodic band Perfect Plan from Sweden,
but I'm going to pick them as my album of the
week. And I'm going to go on to talk on about
another album with you in a minute, Victor, because
we're going to talk about probably Robin McCauley.
But Perfect Plan is my pick of the week. You
know, good band, definitely more pop than rock.
You know, you've got to be in the mood for an
80s AOR band, very light Europe in their heyday.
And, you know, I like Europe and there's a good
deal of that on this album. They do sort of rock
out a little bit more on the odd tracks. And,
you know, there's a song on there, At Your Stone,
which really sort of illustrates that fact. And,
you know, it's definitely good enough to be my
album of the week, so I'm going to pick that
one. So I'm going to come on to Robin McCauley,
and I think you're going to mention it, so maybe
I'll just wait until you get to that, and we
can have a chat. Okay. So I listened to Venom
by Enemy Inside. uh, pretty modern metal, um,
was okay, but there's a million other bands doing
the exact same thing. Listen to dark chapel,
which is Dario from black label society. Uh,
the album had its moments and it's funny as I
was listening to it. I'm thinking a lot of people
say that black label is almost Ozzy light where
Zach is. sounding like Ozzy and doing a lot of
stuff similar to Ozzy. And part of the reason
why I think Ozzy works with Andrew Watt now to
write a lot of stuff is to differentiate from
what Zach is doing there. Absolutely. And Brad
is saying that from the, uh, the excellent podcast,
the Hojo and Hunzi, uh, hard rock house. which
he mentioned because they talk about AOR constantly.
So Dark Chapel to me is kind of like BLS light
at times. So it's a good album, has some really
good songs on it, but I mean, it's not a bad
start. Let's see. I listed the Arianne as well.
I think you kind of summed that up. My album
of the week though. is Plague of Rats by Brainstorm.
This could possibly be, on my year -end top 10,
the Brainstorm album. I've heard of them, but
this is the first time that I've actually listened
to them. I honestly think this is an album, Jeremy,
that if you listen to it, I think you'll really
like it. So, no, it isn't AOR black metal, Brad.
So, but the album that we're going to talk about
here now is Robin McCauley's Spellbound. What's
your thoughts on this album? Yeah, well, my first
thought is I'm very, very disappointed with it
because I really liked Alive. I thought Alive
was alive. It had a certain tempo on there. It
was a heavy album. There was a lot of great tracks
on it. If not every track was very listenable.
I bought the album, still enjoy it. Perfect.
This album. misses the point on many tracks um
there were one or two that were okay i like the
best of me i like one or two others they were
okay um i felt that the songwriting was nowhere
near as good i felt that it really didn't hit
the heaviness of uh the previous album um so
i think it missed it missed a lot of you know
he really didn't push on and release an album
that he could have released and so for me It's
not a must -purchase, whereas the last album
was a must -purchase. Okay, so I agree with you
100%. This album is the biggest letdown for me
this year. As the build -up towards the album,
I kept hearing, this is my heaviest album, this
is my deepest album. This is my best album. And
the first single, I thought, well, the guitars
sound kind of thin. Alive had a very metal sound,
very heavy guitars, a lot of chugging. And I
equated it to, and it made our top 10 for 2023,
was it, or 2022? And I think that caught a lot
of people off guard because it was so good. And
I said it was similar to the Dee Snider albums
that he had released, the last few that were
heavy with his vocals and whatnot. And I was
like, wow, Robin is going to pick up the flag
that Dee is leaving behind because he's no longer
going to release any more solo music. So I was
like, as much as I don't like that Dee's going
to stop, I can live with having Robin be the
guy that can continue with this. And the album
is a huge letdown. Again, it doesn't sound anywhere
near as heavy. The guitars are super thin. The
songs aren't as good. And today, as I was out
for a walk, I listened to an interview that Chris
Aiken did with Robin McCauley. And like a lot
of other Frontiers projects, Robin was paired
up with a songwriter who was writing songs for
the label and is presenting these songs to him.
And the first two albums were written with one
guy, with Alan Del Vecchio, I believe is his
name. He's no longer with Frontiers. And they
switched the songwriting partner up. So obviously
that guy's going to bring his style to the forefront.
And it just, just did not work for me. I just,
I, I, it's a shame because I was looking for
a progression to what he had done. And listen,
Chris Aiken during the interview says that it's
his favorite album with. on it since one of the
early Shanker albums. I think the previous two
albums are better, personally. And I would even
say the Black Swan albums are better. Yeah. So
it's a shame. Yeah. It's definitely a shame.
All right, third question here before we, actually,
no, before we do that, let me just run down what
our picks are. For February 7th, Jeremy picked
Days of Jupiter, The World Was Never Enough.
I picked Saber with Lost in Flames. For February
14th, Jeremy picked Lone Shark. No Sins to Confess.
I picked Lacuna Coil with Sleepless Empire. Sorry,
just to stop you there, I actually picked Crazy
Lakes. Oh, you did? Okay. Wait a second. All
right, so let me take that back. February 14th,
Jeremy picked Thrill of the Bite by Crazy Licks.
All right. February 21st, Jeremy picked Twins
Crew Chapter 4 or Chapter... Yes. Yeah. And I
picked Killswitch Engage, This Consequence. And
for the final week of February, Jeremy picked...
A perfect plan with Heart of a Lion. And I picked
Brainstorm with Plague of Rats. Cool. So let's
see here. Question number three of the night.
My final question of the night. Brad, is Robin
turning AOR? Yeah, that's closer to AOR than
full -on heavy metal, I would say. And that's
kind of the disappointing part. All right. My
question is, what's the most underrated band
in metal or hard rock? Who deserves more love,
and why do they stand out to you? Jeremy, who
would you say? Okay, so this is just obviously
off the top of my head, but I think the most
underrated would probably be UFO, because UFO
have never really sort of, you can't imagine
them ever headlining Download, that sort of thing.
And yet, to me, You know, their material is incredible.
You know, particularly under the Schenker era.
So, yeah, I'd go for UFO. All right. Brad is
saying 220 volt. Interesting. I guess I'll go
with behind me over here. I have the first Fastway
album sort of peeking in. Off the top of my head,
I could say that because I do enjoy all the Dave
King albums. They don't have the longevity that
UFO had, unfortunately. Another band that popped
into my head is Warrior Soul, who I absolutely
love. And up until probably their last two albums,
I think has released nothing but great music.
And that's that. All right. So let's move on
to some points that Jeremy and I have put together.
Well, that Jeremy sent my way. I'm not going
to lie to you folks. Brad is saying, listen to
Eye to Eye. Great album. What, the Scorpions
album? So Brad is saying I did get the Fastway
album because of you. Cool. All right. So question
number one or topic number one here. Do we want
new Tesla music? They say no album. What do you
say, Jeremy? What do you think? Well, yeah. I
mean, the reason why, obviously, I raised it,
they say that they are going to release some
music, but they're not going to release a whole
album. I can see why bands don't want to release
whole albums anymore. In Tesla's case, the last
album was basically Def Leppard. And I don't
want to buy another Def Leppard album. I want
to buy Tesla. I want to buy, you know, what Tesla
were. I'd love to hear something from, you know,
the two albums that were released prior to that
I thought were really good albums. You know,
they were pretty rocky. They were typical Tesla
-sounding albums. I'd love to hear that, but
I don't want to hear the Def Leppard stuff because
I thought it was a bit of a mistake for them.
It sounded polished, but they'd lost a lot of
their true identity playing those albums. playing
that one album. It seems as if they've made up
their mind. I think it's a bit of a shame because
if they were to tour, still tour, it's good to
get new music out there. It sounds as if they
might release the odd thing here or there. They're
releasing a live album, I think, coming up soon.
But it would be a shame if we don't hear a really
good, rocky album from Tesla again. But, you
know, they've got a fair few in their back catalogue
and a bunch of stuff that listen to that. Yeah.
Much to your point, I love Into the Now, which
was the last album with Tommy Skio. And we're
talking about early 2000s. That album came out.
I mean, that came out around. Oh five, somewhere
in that area. So we're talking about 20 years
forever more, which was the first album without
Tommy to me, definitely Mrs. Tommy. It's much
like Def Leppard missing Steve Clark. It was,
it's, it misses the bite. But you know, there's
tracks like breaking free, which I love that
song. But after that, I mean, as you said, the
Def Tesla album shock, and then this latest single
they put out just is not good. You know, to hear
what grasped Tesla back in the day was their
in -your -face rock. And for them to go back
and just do like... Laurel Canyon, 70s rock,
some boogie rock stuff, which is like, this isn't
what I wanted from me. Where's Coming At You
Live? Where's Yesterday's Gone? Where's Lady
Luck? Where's, you know, where's, and then I'm
sure if I look at all these credits, probably
Tommy Skio's the one that's behind a lot of these.
So. To mention a very British quote, I think
they've lost their plot. Record Store Day release
next month is going to be them releasing Real
to Real on vinyl, which is their covers album,
which when that album came out, I remember people
complaining and saying, this is great. But I
want new Tesla. And for them to cover songs that
we're already hearing a million times on the
radio, what's the point? Why do we need Tesla
covering space trucking by Deep Purple? Yeah.
Why didn't they just do Smoke on the Water or
Woman from Tokyo? You know, something else that's
already on the radio a million times a day. All
right. Other topic that you sent my way. This
one's good. Not to say the other one wasn't.
Has Tesla gone AOR? All depends. Vandenberg plays
Whitesnake. Shanker plays UFO. Dirk Schneider
plays Accept. Is that a good thing? Yeah, Brad,
they did some decent covers. I'm not saying that
they didn't do space trucking good. It's just
that even Ace Frehley covered space trucking.
It's like, again, someone else doing this song?
At least they're not enunciating like Ace does
it. But anyway, Jeremy, what do you think? Vandenberg,
Schenker, Dirk Schneider? Is this a good or a
bad thing? Okay. So I had a little think about
this today and I came out on top saying this
is a good thing. Okay. There's a few reasons
why. One is I actually, I'm going to see all
three of those. I'm actually going to see all
three. I just realized only just now. Because
Dirk Steiner is on the tour with Saxon, so he's
going to play Balls to the Wall. I've got a ticket
for Schenker playing UFO sometime this year.
He's coming to Manchester, which is always a
great thing. And also Vandenberg is coming to
Manchester, I think, and he's playing Whitesnake.
So I'm going to see all three. And it's not just
for me, which is an enjoyment on its own. But
I think it's really good for the young people
who are getting into rock because the reason
is a lot of these guys who get into rock, they're
not like us. They don't remember this stuff.
So they're all sort of listening to their dad's
record collections and they want to go out and
see live music and they want to see this old
stuff perform live. And they're being performed
by a member of that band. So they're not charlatans
just sort of saying, well, we're playing anything.
They were actually playing this music at some
point. So they're seeing that particular person
of a particular time. And I think that's good.
It keeps rock music rolling. So yeah, overall,
I think that's a really good thing. It doesn't
mean to say that those members who are playing
those... things, Dirk Schneider, Schenker, Vandenberg,
can't play their new music as well. They can
go out on tour afterwards and play their new
music and we'll go and watch it because we like
to hear their new stuff as well. But it's really
good for dads, sons, daughters, mothers to go
and see, go out, go out and watch them, enjoy
the music and go and listen to the original albums.
Okay. I think it's a good thing as well. I'm
not a huge Whitesnake fan, but I'm cognizant
of the fact that you're never getting Whitesnake
live again. UFO is done, so it makes sense that
Shanker would be kind of flying that torch. And
Dirk Schneider actually has more original members
of Accept than Accept does. So, sure, why not?
I think it's a good thing. Listen, anything to
keep hard rock and metal alive, I think is good.
So long as they're not ruining these songs live,
I'm good with it. And like Brad just said, you
know, we don't need re -records of these songs.
I think that Michael Shanker just did it. I think
Shanker did a good job. It kind of confuses me
that he had Slash and a few other guest players.
I think Joe Hoekstra is on that as well. Because
Michael is one of the most influential guitarists.
However, I think he's at the stage and at the
point where he can do whatever the hell he wants.
I know a lot of people crapped on Axl Rose singing
on Love to Love. I actually think that song sounds
good. And only because that song is so influential
on so many levels, it's influenced different
people. I remember seeing Angelus Apatrida years
ago and hearing them play a song, one of their
originals. And instantly I said, you guys get
that from Dave Mustaine, don't you? Yeah, that
was influenced by this song. I'm like, well,
that was influenced by UFO's Love to Love. That
one chord progression that Michael is doing with
an open chord in the middle of the song, which
he later uses again on the Desert song on Built
to Destroy, is what I was referring to. It's
something that Megadeth used, a similar style,
and then Angela Sepatrida also did something
similar. So there's that. I found the Michael
Shanker one enjoyable. I think there's a few
tracks off it that are good. I think Joey Tempest
did a phenomenal job on, did he do Too Hot to
Handle, I believe? I thought that was great.
Some of the other ones I wasn't keen on, but
because I'm not keen on some of the guest vocalists
he brought in. I'm not a big Jeff Scott Soto
fan, so if you have him sing two tracks, then
you give him a shot, and then you're like, okay,
sounds like Jeff Scott Soto ruining a song that
I like. Steven Piercy kind of did nothing for
me on Shoot Shoot. It was one of these things
where you're like, okay, well, let Steven sound
like Steven, and Steven just kind of sounded
generic, personally. He's got Eric Grunwald on
the tour, I think, doing all the vocals. So I
think that should be good. Short tour so he can
do the whole thing. I think Robin McCauley is
going to be doing some stuff with him as well
on this tour, if I'm not mistaken. I don't know
if he's going to be doing select dates or if
they're doing like a... uh, tales of rock or
shankers. What's the other name that he goes
out by where he's got all the singers. Yeah.
I don't, I don't remember. It doesn't matter.
Uh, but anyway, yeah. So I don't know if Eric
and Robin are going to be doing the shows that,
that, that to me would be more interesting than,
than, um, Graham Bonnet and Gary Barton. What's
that? Gary Barton. Yeah. Doogie White is okay,
but I mean, I think Doogie is great at what he
does, but Doogie is just kind of generic to me.
So anyway. All right. Well, Brad is saying Eric
is a great singer. Should be good. Absolutely.
So anyway, we're going to be wrapping things
up here. I do want to thank Jeremy, as usual,
for joining me for these great shows. It is always
fun to talk back and forth about these albums.
I wasn't expecting you to agree with me on the
Macaulay one, but it looks like you did. I thought
we were going to have a little sparring match,
but no. It was fine. We were both kind of on
the same level of disappointment, seems like.
I want to thank Brad for joining us in the chat.
I want to thank Edgar Winterson, who was here
as well for a little bit. And that's pretty much
it, folks. Thanks again for listening. And we
will see you next time right here on Signals
from Mars. See you, folks. podcast you can subscribe
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