They'll be dancing in the streets of Newtownards, County Down, as news erupts that hometown hero Ricky Warwick has triumphed in our latest Tracks Of The Week conflict, beating out Deep Purple in a manner so convincing it brings to mind Alexander the Great's victory at the Battle of Gaugamela. So congratulations to him. And, indeed, to the vanquished.
Paradise Lost came in third, but we've already moved on to this week's eight-headed tournament of rock. The jousters are below.
Castle Rat - Serpent
By turns riffed up and hazy, the latest piece of the fantastically minded heavy metallers’ next album The Bestiary swirls a compelling blend of gnarly, insistent guitars, dreamy textures, twin-lead flourishes and melancholy edges. Part Banshees, part Sabbath, all them. “There's a tantalising quality to the song,” Riley ‘the Rat Queen’ Pinkerton says, “it's seductive and sympathetic all at once. The drums are bombastic, the tempo pushes toward this near-march that’s as danceable as it is headbang-worthy.”
Mirador - Fortune’s Fate
One of our favourites from the new partnership between Greta Van Fleet guitarist Jake Kiszka and Ida Mae’s Chris Turpin, Fortune’s Fate finds Mirador going full Led Zeppelin while also stirring in their own, old-world brand of folky, early bluesified rock’n’roll. There’s a hypnotic mix of sadness and primal, earthy energy that grabs you by the gut, teamed brilliantly with Chris’s distinctive voice that seems to come from somewhere deep and raw. Definitely worth checking out the full album, which comes out next month.
Märvel - Look! It’s Rock And Roll
Look! It’s that high-energy, madcap Swedish superhero power trio Märvel! Rocking and rollicking along with the sort of loose yet biting, gung-ho partytime vibe that they do so well, Look! It’s Rock And Roll is a total floor-filler with the chops and swagger of Thin Lizzy, Hellacopters and other such righteous humans in its bloodstream. Like the sound of that? There’s a new album on the way, coming out through their own label.
Liam St John - Trouble
Roots rocker Liam St John (based in Nashville but originally from the Pacific Northwest) might come over all currrntry with that voice, jacket and video full of vast, rugged American landscapes, but make no mistake – the guy rocks hard on the muscular yet characterful Trouble. If The Cadillac Three and Royal Blood got together for a heavy jam session after a steak dinner and some strong coffee, they might have cooked up something like this. Like the taste of that? We sure as hell do. Liam’s debut album, Man Of The North, comes out in September.
Sonny Jim - Fake It Til We Make It
The Welsh rockers’ catchy new single comes with soaring, anthemic guitars so gleefully Billy Duffy-esque you’ll wonder if you’ve accidentally hit play on a She Sells Sanctuary cover or similar…. but you haven’t! This is not that, honest! Cult fans will almost certainly sneer at Sonny Jim’s not-so-subtle hat-tip, but really there are far worse influences to have, especially when they help a driving, full-of-life rocker like this. A lot of fun. Tasty solo, too. Keep an ear out for more from their camp.
A Thousand Horses - Voices
We saw these countrified Nashvillians at their first UK show in six years the other week, and realised we’d forgotten how many grade-A bangers they have up their sleeves. Now, though, they’re ditching the Stetsons and making like a southern Soundgarden via Green Day’s Boulevard Of Broken Dreams on this moody, strident new single. “Rock’n’roll has always been at the core of our sound and with this next album we are diving all the way in,” guitarist Bill Satcher says. “‘Voices’ is the first taste of what’s to come, the full throttle ATH rock album that’s been sleeping in our souls all along.”
Steve Plunkett - Turn Up The Radio
40 years ago, Autograph released Turn Up The Radio, the best song Def Leppard never wrote, a song so good and so convincingly Lepp-like you could have swapped for almost any song on Hysteria without weakening one of the most successful albums ever. Now, frontman Steve Plunkett has rerecorded it, along with the rest of Autograph's debut album, in the hope that we can all "rock again" like we did back then. It's a lesser beast without the original's Mutt Lange-like production, but a great chorus is a great chorus, and Turn Up The Radio still has a great chorus.
The Lazys - Hot Under The Collar
Aussie dudes The Lazys run the same sort of razor-honed good-time rock’n’roll racecourse as Airbourne, The Darkness, Danko Jones (but mostly Airbourne) on Hot Under The Collar. Yes, it’s AC/DC-fanboying of the most shameless kind, but if you’re hanging out with Classic Rock, that’s probably not too much of a problem, is it? They’re playing some UK shows in the first week of September, if y’need something fun and riff-heavy with which to banish them back-to-school blues.
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