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As the great Derek Smalls so memorably observed, there’s a fine line between stupid and clever, and it’s a line with which Lenny Wolf is familiar.

Rising to fame with his brazen, almost parodic first Kingdom Come album, Wolf’s overt worship of Led Zeppelin – or at least of Led Zeppelin’s success – coupled with his pre-fame life as a hairdresser made it hard to imbue his offerings with the gravity he seemed to feel they deserved.

Yet there was undeniable talent in him too. With Rendered Waters, he has reimagined quite successfully what Kingdom Come might have sounded like had they not sounded like Led Zeppelin. I’ve Been Trying has been stripped back and given a ringing chorus melody, Can’t Deny has some thudding nu guitars, Pushing Hard a fine, bright texture, and so it goes on.

There are three new songs alongside eight KC warhorses, one of which, Blue Trees, proves that Wolf’s touch remains deft.

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.