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House Of Lords began as something of an AOR supergroup, boasting keyboard deity Gregg Guiffria alongside Lanny Cordola, Kenny Mary, Chuck Wright and the mighty pipes of James Christian. They were, as such a line-up would suggest, somewhat tasty.

What remains, two decades on, are Christian and the desire to recreate the colossal pomp of Sahara, their 1990 high water mark.

There are moments on Big Money where Christian comes close to succeeding. He has a terrific voice, impassioned and dramatic, and when it coincides with a suitably vast tune – the opening one-two of Big Money and One Man Down, for example – the band are impressive and imposing. The gas leaks slowly from the tank after that, and Christian is asked to bear too much of the load.

House Of Lords though, remain defenders of a particular kind of faith and their zealots will find enough here to worship.

Jon Hotten is an English author and journalist. He is best known for the books Muscle: A Writer's Trip Through a Sport with No Boundaries and The Years of the Locust. In June 2015 he published a novel, My Life And The Beautiful Music (Cape), based on his time in LA in the late 80s reporting on the heavy metal scene. He was a contributor to Kerrang! magazine from 1987–92 and currently contributes to Classic Rock. Hotten is the author of the popular cricket blog, The Old Batsman, and since February 2013 is a frequent contributor to The Cordon cricket blog at Cricinfo. His most recent book, Bat, Ball & Field, was published in 2022.