Various – Singles: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack 25th Anniversary
DragonForce - Reaching Into Infinity
“Like all the best power metal bands, DragonForce are in on the gag. Their seventh album doesn’t stint on the Wagnerian bombast, from the Ritalin-powered kick drum assault of Astral Empire to the epic Guitar Hero duels of, well, pretty much everything on here. But there are pop smarts amid the silliness – you’re never more than a minute or two away from an epic chorus, whether that’s the arms-aloft anthemic Judgement Day or the poker-faced power balladry of Silence.”
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Glenn Hughes - Play Me Out: Expanded Edition
“Listening to this now it’s hard to imagine that anyone was having a better time in the late 70s than Glenn Hughes. Even the neon-flecked album artwork suggests flickering disco lighting and cocaine sweats accrued in the toilets and on the dancefloor. Overall, though, it’s fairly impeccable and not just a sign of the times, Glenn turns the funk up to 10 with the help of Trapeze alumni Mel Galley and Dave Holland as well as Pat Thrall, strings and a horn section.”
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Biters - The Future Ain’t What It Used To Be
“Make no mistake, Biters are a great rock band. They look the part, they act the part, Tuk is a proper star, and they can toss off tunes as easily as Gordon Ramsay plates crab cakes: Back To Georgia and Hollywood are both masterful ballads.”
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Ritchie Blackmore’s Rainbow - Stranger In Us All (Expanded)
“This plays like an album nearly 20 years out of its time, the missing link between the two eras as Blackmore heads back in the direction of Rainbow’s mid-70s heyday. Stand-outs Hunting Humans (Insatiable), Stand And Fight and Ariel could all have been recorded then. So too a great new version of The Yardbirds’ Still I’m Sad, a rocked-up take on Grieg’s 19th-century Hall Of The Mountain King, and a live Temple Of The King among the three bonus tracks.”
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The best new rock albums you can buy this week
