Gun - Favourite Pleasures album review

Veteran rockers get their melodic groove on

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Cover art for Gun - Favourite Pleasures album

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Ever since they reunited nearly a decade ago, Gun have been threatening to break out with an album packed with hits from stem to stern. Well, now they’ve done it.

Their latest, softwareuiphraseguid=“27d96ffa-6dd7-42aa-9b2e-d83ec2597c9a”>Favourite Pleasures, is the kind of record that makes you smile and lose the plot. It has the effortless enthusiasm of kids appreciating the power of music for the first time, combined with the experience of musicians who know – just know – how to write a song that comes from the soul.

Everywhere you look on this album you’re smacked by a seriously strong track. She Knows dives straight in with a smoothly pop-rock groove, while the title track nestles into a Zeppelin-style funk motif, and Take Me Down has action-packed simplicity.

Dante Gizzi has a vocal style full of character, while Jools Gizzi and Tommy Gentry are at turns gentle then snarling on guitar. There are bouncy anthems (Silent Lovers), dark moods (Tragic Heroes) and a surprise cover of the Beastie Boys’ (You’ve Gotta) Fight For Your Right (To Party).

Here’s a dare: play this album and remain unmoved.

Malcolm Dome
Malcolm Dome

Malcolm Dome had an illustrious and celebrated career which stretched back to working for Record Mirror magazine in the late 70s and Metal Fury in the early 80s before joining Kerrang! at its launch in 1981. His first book, Encyclopedia Metallica, published in 1981, may have been the inspiration for the name of a certain band formed that same year. Dome is also credited with inventing the term "thrash metal" while writing about the Anthrax song Metal Thrashing Mad in 1984. With the launch of Classic Rock magazine in 1998 he became involved with that title, sister magazine Metal Hammer, and was a contributor to Prog magazine since its inception in 2009. He died in 2021.