Rock Blog #37: The Brave, Oz Hawe Peterson's Rendezvous, Find Me, Peaceful Minds, Keys, Fate, Crossbone Skully

Just in time before the new year, here are the last reviews for 2024. I've written these during the last few weeks, but frankly I've forgotten to post them! There's a lot of stuff I haven't had the chance to listen, but I try to get through most of the releases I have access to, because the "Best Of 2024" list has to be put together...

THE BRAVE released their first album ”Battle Cries” in 1991. It was produced by the Elefante brothers John and Dino, and over the years it has reached a semi-classic status. The second album ”Trust” saw a change in direction from the anthemic rock of its’ predecessor. The next album ”Rise” was released twenty years later and featured a female vocalist Amanda Z. The album itself featured several re-recorded older tracks and a few new songs. 

”Evie’s Little Garden” emerged in 2021, with guitarist Stayce Roberts as the lead singer. I liked that album, it was more in the vein of the band’s debut contained some very good songs. Their next album ”Gravedigger” (2022) has completely flown under the radar, I thought that this new album was the follow-up to ”Evie”! 

”Carnival Of Sins” (RRRR) is a rather good mixture of Harem Scarem, Winger, Def Leppard and Alice Cooper with some modern rock thrown in. And Christian message in the lyrics. The songs aren’t immediate hits, but I recommend you give them some time, I wasn’t as convinced yesterday as I am today. The more AOR-type of tracks like ”When You Believe” and ”Undertow” are the ”easiest” ones I guess, but there are some really good ones among the others as well.

OZ HAWE PETERSSON’S RENDEZVOUS is a project put together by Osukaru guitarist Oz Hawe Petersson and keyboard player Matias Rosén. The vocals are provided by several fine vocalists, including Fredrik Werner (Osukaru / Daytona), Jane Gould, Chris Rosander and Boulevard singer David Forbes. The songs range from smooth AOR of the Forbes-sung ”These Tears” and ”All Roads Lead Back To You” to more hard rocking songs such as ”Midnight Lady - Dangerous Game” (trouble deciding the title or what?). It’s all pretty classy stuff with no real fillers in sight, so easily worth an RRRR rating.

I’ve liked all previous FIND ME albums quite a lot, but ”Nightbound” (RRRr) is a bit disappointing. None of the songs are really bad, but they’re just fairly standard AOR stuff. Robbie LaBlanc does his best to elevate them and he does succeed to a degree, the small ”r” is for his performance. There’s one song that stands out, and that’s the Survivor cover ”I See You In Everyone”. The others can’t really compete with it, even though there are two Jim Peterik songs among them.

PEACEFUL MINDS is a Swedish band and ”Til’ I’m Dying” (RRRr) is their first album as far as I know.  The album features Within Temptation guitarist Stefan Helleblad as guest artist, and he can surely adapt to a more classic rock style too. Whitesnake, Thin Lizzy and Europe are few of the names that pop up when listening to this. Pretty good stuff, and ”Caught In The Middle” is the top pick for me.

”The Grand Seduction” (RRR) is the second album from KEYS. The band features the keyboard maestro, super songwriter Mark Mangold and Cyhra/ex-Amaranthe vocalist Jake E. The idea behind the band is that all music is done with keyboards, using plug-ins, samplers and whatever gadgets. Kind of a modern approach, yet at the same time the sound of the album harkens back to the seventies. The biggest downside of the album are the drums, they sound very mechanical and lifeless. 

Mangold’s background as an AOR hit writer doesn’t shine through, these songs are somewhere between classic 70’s rock and progressive rock. Jake E’s Amaranthe connection does raise its’ head with ”Vortex”, the song sounds like it could have been written for that band. Probably the best chorus of the album.

FATE are trying to ”Reconnect N’Ignite” with their latest album, but if I didn’t know, I couldn’t tell that this is the same band that released ”A Matter Of Attitude”. Actually it really isn’t, as there’s only bassist Peter Steincke from the early line-ups present. Vocalist is Per Johansson who is in the band for the third time, he was featured on the fine ”Scratch ’n’ Stiff” album in 1990, then he was a part of the band’s first comeback between 2004 and 2009 and in 2023 returned to the band again. His sound has changed quite a bit, he sounds grittier than before, but at times you can hear some echoes of the said ”S’n’S” album. As for the music, the happy pop metal sounds are gone, replaced by something more sinister and metal. Only some of the keyboard work and couple of the songs remind me of the old Fate. RRR.

CROSSBONE SKULLY is a project by Tommy Henriksen and Tommy Denander, but what has raised the project’s profile the most is the fact that legendary producer Mutt Lange is involved. If you’re expecting something like ”Hysteria” or ”Waking Up The Neighbours”, you might be disappointed, as ”Evil World Machine” (RRR) is very much in the vein of ”Back In Black” and AC/DC, especially the first few songs. 

There are some songs which are more in ”Pyromania” style, like ”Ima Bone Machine”, ”I’m Unbreakable” and the balladic ”The Last Night On Earth”. ”Let’s Bust The Trust” is a bit of a departure from the overall sound, it sounds like an Irish drinking anthem! ”High On You” is the only song that moves to the Adams/Twain direction, a slightly country’ish pop rocker.