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Born in the late 60's, Chesy hails from a Welsh mining village with a long name and was pretty glad when he got the Hell out of there. He got into Rock/Metal in about 1980, thanks to a TISWAS related incident (Rainbow video for All Night Long) and thankfully has never looked back. Chesy often sang solo in the school choir, but thanks to a puberty related incident his voice is now completely bolloxed, although in his own head Paul thinks he sounds like a blend of Coverdale and Dio (R.I.P). He was brought up on the classics - Deep Purple, Rainbow, Thin Lizzy, Rush, Whitesnake and loved melodic rock and the Hair Bands of the 80's. (Nowadays, he has progressed a little and prefers a more technical and/or progressive metal - Dream Theater, Rush, Symphony X, Porcupine Tree, Pain Of Salvation, Spock's Beard. He hates Black and Death Metal (can't stand the grunting) but for some unknown reason loves the magnificent Opeth! He wont stop this blog until his beloved FM finally play the likes of the NEC as a headlining act!!!

Friday 25 May 2012

Summers - 364




If you’re one of the (very) lucky few who managed to catch Summers live performance at the recent ZRock festival in Bilston - I say lucky as, a) hardly any fecker attended the stellar line up of bands, and b) the schedule was fucked about with so much on the Sunday, your average punter would need they psychic skills of Doris Stokes to know that they were going to play an hour earlier than intended!

Those who were lucky enough to see this young AOR-tastic band were left with a nice warm fuzzy feeling at the end of their set. You see, Summers are one of THE BEST melodic rock bands to come out of Southampton, the South Coast, the UK!

It’s inevitable that this band, which lets face it, are way to young to be writing shit hot AOR songs, and will be tagged with all plaudits that lead firmly to Sheffield and Def Leppard comparisons. But they say if it aint broke, don’t fix it, Summers make no apology whatsoever for being a 21st Century Leppard. A 80s sounding Leppard in the name of Summers is better than the current actual Leppard. On the evidence of the first few listens of 364, this album is that strong it could have been written by Def Leppard any time between 1980-1984. This alone tells you how much I love this album, and know doubt you will one once you get your mitts on this potential future classic

Summers get their name for the 2 founding brothers Crash (Vox) and Ricky (Bass & BVs) Summers. Making up the band are Jase (Guitar & BVs), Joedy Rose (Guitar & BVs), and Andy Pope (Drums & BVs)

It’s almost Def Leppard by numbers - for ‘Steal Away’, read ‘Animal’, for ‘Tool Late’, read ‘When Love and Hate Collide’. This isn’t criticism here, its high praise indeed

Opening track, 'Catch Me' is a catchy as baseball covered in molasses. With a chorus that gets you immediately hooked, it’s as clear as day that Summers have a talent for all things melodic. Crash is as close to 80s Joe Elliott than a 80s Joe Elliott is to Joe Elliott!! I know what I'm talking about -  I think! All the guys chip in with BVs and that itself is a beautiful thing. I’m a sucker for 4 & 5 part harmonies, and few can muster such quality like Summers have here

All the tracks on offer have been written with maximum enjoyment to the listener, catchy hooks, great solos, even greater choruses. The production for an unsigned band makes them seem more like a stadium band. This could surely be a target for them given the right circumstances


The only question is whether or not this style of melodic rock has had its day. Certainly AOR/Melodic Rock has had its day, but currently the resurgence and demand in melodic rock (take Glee for example) is a high a stock rating as it’s had since the early 90s and that’s not a bad thing. I certainly hope that there is a future for Summers out there as a damn site more people deserve to hear music of this unparalleled quality. Someone needs to get off their fat arse and sign this band up, and NOW.  '364' is infinitely better than most of the stuff I've heard the past couple of years, from new or established bands.

I beg you to catch Summers when they return to The Robin 2 in August on their own headline gig. I'll be the one offering refunds if you aren’t in agreement with how good they are live

95/100

www.officialsummers.com

Summers - 364

1. Shot In The dark
2. Superhero
3. Girls
4. Too Late
5. Sometimes
6. Steal Away
7. Lets Make Love
8. Billy
9. Lets Go Round
10. Told You So
11. Terminator
12. Rockmachine

2 comments:

  1. Hit the nail on the head with that review.

    Nicely done!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Saw this band supporting Tyketto last year, great stuff. I assume the album will get released one day.

    ReplyDelete

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