Hard Rock Reviews
As much as I like to call myself and this site Kevy Metal, my journey into music actually began with hard rock. Seventies and nineties hardrock – plus contemporary bands inspired by these styles – are still a significant part of what I listen to, and therefore, Album of the Week reviews on hard rock bands are published frequently. You can find all of them right here. Overlaps with my heavy metal reviews inevitably exist.
Looking for something specific, but can’t find it by browsing the reviews? Searching by artist name or release title using the search bar might bring up some Album of the Week reviews I have written before I started tagging my reviews properly.
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Album of the Week 47-2016: Robert Plant and the Strange Sensation – Mighty ReArranger
“My peers may flirt with cabaret / Some fake the rebel yell / Me, I’m moving up to higher ground / I must escape their hell”. Sure, these words may come across a bit arrogant, but they’re very true first and foremost. Not a single member of any legendary group…
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Album of the Week 46-2016: X – Vanishing Vision
For a band that would be all over the place stylistically, X Japan – still just X at the time – debuted with a surprisingly metal oriented effort. All the idiosyncrasies that would later make them one of Japan’s biggest bands are here – not in the last place their…
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Album of the Week 43-2016: Bad Company – Bad Company
Back in the seventies, supergroups sometimes actually were bigger than the sum of their parts. Led Zeppelin could be considered one, but the first band to release an album on their Swan Song label is an even better example. Bad Company combined the talents of Free’s Paul Rodgers (vocals, piano)…
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Album of the Week 37-2016: Led Zeppelin – Presence
Led Zeppelin’s untitled fourth album is generally considered their best work, along their two-disc magnum opus ‘Physical Graffiti’ and possibly the rawness of their debut. Opinions on their seventh studio album ‘Presence’ are a little more divided, but I personally consider it the last of their perfect albums. It’s a…
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Album of the Week 34-2016: Thin Lizzy – Johnny The Fox
Immortality was never far away for Thin Lizzy, which is ironic, given the early death of frontman Phil Lynott. ‘Live And Dangerous’ will always remain in my top 3 albums of all time; even though it was heavily doctored in the studio, almost every song sounded so much more alive…
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Album of the Week 29-2016: Golden Earring – Moontan
Outside of the Netherlands, Golden Earring is known as that band from ‘Radar Love’ and maybe ‘Twilight Zone’. For any Dutchman, they are the biggest Rock band in the country and have been so for a majority of their fifty-five years of existence. Yes, fifty-five uninterrupted years. Their mind blowing…
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Album of the Week 21-2016: Dir En Grey – Uroboros
Ever since Dir En Grey singer Kyo discovered he possessed an almost inhuman grunt, the band’s music grew increasingly heavier to accommodate this quality. Despite the presence of a couple of excellent ballads, they took it too far on ‘The Marrow Of A Bone’. Being the type of band they…
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Album of the Week 19-2016: Ace Frehley – Ace Frehley
When all original Kiss members released their solo debuts on the same day – September 18th 1978, to be exact – critics viewed it as a cash grab. Given Kiss’ commercial track record, it probably was, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that the music isn’t good. In fact, Paul Stanley’s…
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Album of the Week 14-2016: Ted Nugent – Ted Nugent
Sure, we could spend all day discussing how obnoxious Ted Nugent can be as a person, though I suspect him of making it seem much worse than it actually is, but let’s not forget that his debut album is easily the best Hard Rock album from 1976 – a year…
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