Whats in a name? I have never been a fan of labelling bands into pigeonholes. Steven Wilson hates being banded around as ‘Prog’ is a prime example. I’ve had some right doozies over the years appearing in a press release which I am not going give further promotion here, as some are bollux.
What I do like is ‘Rock’ music, you know…. the proper stuff, not Rock as the mainstream call it when you hear ROCK WEEK on X-Factor. I like anything from Anthrax to Zebra, ACDC to ZZ Top and shit loads in between. Theres no ‘New Wave’ really, but its how you perceive Classic Rock to be. For me, I’m a bloke of a certain age and grew up at the right time for ‘Classic Rock’ – bands such as Deep Purple, Whitesnake, Rainbow, Rush and Lizzy. When NWOBHM was termed I was about 12 and a lot of those NWOBHM bands I would today call Classic Rock – Saxon, Maiden, Diamond Head, Leppard etc. Its music played in certain style or attitude and the feeling you derive from listening to it.
That said, I totally get what the guys at NWOCR are doing, and ANYTHING that promotes great bands, and great music, whether they are new, new-ish, or been around for a few years and lumping them into one category isn’t necessarily a bad thing.
So, this is hopefully the first of NWOCRs version of ‘Now Thats What I call Music’, which back in the day ran to about 3,456,821 volumes
Across 2 CDs there are 42 of some of the finest bands you’ve heard, and haven’t heard of, but you will soon want to be stalking them across all forms of social media.
There are bands on here who for me are ahead of the curve of the rest of the bands on offer, such as Mason Hill, Scarlet Rebels, Hollowstar, These Wicked Rivers, Sons Of Liberty, Revival Black, SKAM, Collateral, Phil Campbell, Blackwater Conspiracy, and Thundermother, and its their songs that stand out for me. It could be because I have seen most of these live so far and have bought their music, so I’m partly down the road with them already and I am already a fan.
That said, out of the remainder, there’s a few new names on my list that I want to hear a lot more of – Elles Bailey who reminds me of Susan Tedeschi, Rews, and Bastette, probably because I do have a thing for female vocalists, also The New Roses and Ashen Reach.
There are only a couple of songs that don’t agree with me, but I’ll leave that up to you, the listener to decide as not everything can hit the mark 100% of the time.
As a Volume 1, this is a great starting point for all of these bands. There’s some banging music on offer, and I hope like me that once you hear some of these bands for the first time or if you’ve heard them before, that you’ll go out and support their music, buy an album and some merchandise direct from these bands, because you have all these bands jockeying for position, and it is a bloody tough time for them even before Covid set in.
I can see the TV appeal….’for every CD bought, NWOCR donates £2 to all the artists on this CD. Your £2 will keep one band member in beer for approximately 15 minutes, so please text 69627 (NWOCR) immediately’.
If you were an avid gig goer, pre-Covid, use that money to buy this CD first, and then the bands albums, you know it makes sense! And I guarantee you’ll feel a lot better for it.
Needle In The Groove 