Fair Warning is a German hard rock band founded in 1991 by former V2 vocalist Tommy Heart and former Zeno bassist Ule W. Ritgen. The music can be described as melodic hardrock in the vein of AOR. There's a lot of melody on the album but also some good guitarplaying. The songs are okey but there's always something missing to make it to the next level. The production on "4" is also quite flat. There should have been moore bass!

Andy Malecek left the band in 2000 and founded Last Autumn's Dream together with 3 former members of Europe and has released 7 albums with that band.

1)Heart on the run (7,5) Not just melodic hardrock but an powerful and epic qualitysong.

2)Through the fire (7,5)

3)Break free (6,5)

4)Forever (7,0)

5)Tell me I'm wrong (7,5) A nice and pompous ballad.

6)Dream (5,0)

7)I fight (7,0)

8)Time will tell (7,0) If it hadn't been for the repetitive chorus this would have been a pretty good song.

9)Eyes of love (7,0)

10)Find my way (7,0)

11)Night falls (6,0) A ballad.

12)Wait (7,0) Good melody and a powerful song.

13)For the young (4,0) Sounds like Scottish folkmusic with bagipes and choir. But it's not good at all.

Score: 6,62

Tommy Heart-vocals

Helge Engelke-guitars

Andy Malecek-guitars

Ule W. Ritgen-bass

plus

Phillippe Cangas-drums on all song except 7.

Airbourne, from Australia, was founded in 2003. They released a 8-track EP in 2004 and this is their 1st full albumrelease. They might be from Australia like AC/DC and they might be playing hardrock in the same vein as AC/DC, but the fact is that this album sounds VERY much AC/DC. Just not as good. The album won "Best debut" on the magazine Metal Hammers Golden gods awards in 2008.

1)Stand up for rock'n'roll (8,5) Damn! Rock'n'roll!!

2)Runnin' wild (7,5) Good but too repetitive.

3)Too much, too young, too fast (7,0) Is this a new AC/DC-song?

4)Diamond in the rough (6,0) They have stolen the introriff from AC/DC and it sounds like another AC/DC-coversong but not as good as the original and the screaming pig-vocals is beginning to get on my nerves.

5)Fat city (5,5) AC/DC-sounding bands like Krokus and Bullet have their own style but this band is a total copy of their favourite band and the songs are just repetitions of the refrain over and over and over and over again.

6)Blackjack (7,0)

7)What's eatin' you (5,0)

8)Girls in black (7,0)

9)Cheap wine and cheaper women (6,0)

10)Heartbreaker (7,5)

11)Hellfire (6,0)

Score: 6,64

Joel O'Keeffe-vocals and guitars

David Roads-guitars

Justin Streets-bass

Ryan O'Keeffe-drums

This is the 10th album from the ex. Black Sabbath-singer. It was recorded in his home studio "The Bunker" in Los Angeles and produced by himself and Kevin Churko and reached nr.4 on the US Billboard chart. The album continues Ozzy's flirt with modern heavy metal which I haven't been much of a fan of. Actually all of Ozzy's albums lack something, good songs maybe? He has made some good music but as a whole there are so much better music out there that I don't feel that I have to own any records by him. This also goes for this album. Some good songs, some ok and some that are not so good. But whatta hell, he earns his money so he don't have to make 'em perfect does he?

Gus G is from Greece and has played with Mystic Prophecy, Dream Evil, Nightrage and Arch Enemy. Tommy Clufetos has played with Alice Cooper, Ted Nugent, Lesley Roy, John 5 and Rob Zombie. Adam Wakeman is the son of Yes keyboardist Rick Wakeman and has toured with Ozzy for some years and has released some soloalbums and albums with his father and played with Annie Lennox, Travis, Atomic Kitten and more. Rob Nicholson also playes with Rob Zombie and played in Cryptic Slaughter in the 80's.

1)Let it die (7,5)

2)Let me hear you scream (7,5)

3)Soul sucker (7,5)

4)Life won't wait (7,5)

5)Diggin' me down (8,0)

6)Crucify (6,5)

7)Fearless (6,0)

8)Time (5,5)

9)I want it more (7,5)

10)Latimer's mercy (7,0)

11)I love you all (-)

Score: 7,05

Ozzy Osburne-vocals

Gus G-guitar (b.1980)

Rob Nicholson-bass (b.1969)

Tommy Clufetos-drums (b.1979)

Adam Wakeman-keyboards (b.1974)

Turisas is a Finnish band that plays a mix of folk and power metal and I often come to think of the Italian band Rhapsody when I hear the music on this album. On the first listens I did not like it very much, it was too messy and chaotic at times, and it is but when I listended more I could appreaciate the pompous and big playing and singing with big choruses. They actually play with a classical secion of 19 players and a 13-piece choir and that deserves respect! This is their 3rd album and the cover of it is great! You can actually see what you're gonna hear just by looking at the cover.

1)The march of the Varangian guard (7,5) Pomopous Tolkien-fantasy-metal. A good and powerful song but haven't we heard this before too many times?

2)Take the day! (8,0) Storytelling beginning and then a powerful chorus. I like the build-up to the chorus. The classical instruments relly makes it powerful. No keyboards!

3)Hunting pirates (7,5) Like the accordion mixed in with metal!

4)Venetoi! - Prasinoi! (7,5) Full frontal attack with orchestral power and double bassdrum action.

5)Stand up and fight (6,0) No, this one is to messy and chaotic.

6)The great escape (7,0) I want the songs to develop more and be longer. They sound similiar to eachother and ends too soon.

7)Fear the fear (7,5)

8)End of an empire (7,5)

9)The bosphuros freezes over (8,0) A very nice narrated and big choir-song. The choir is in finnish wich is nice!

Score: 7,39

Mathias Nygård-vocals

Jussi Wickström-guitar

Hannes Horma-bass

Tude Lehtonen-drums

Netta Skog-accordion

Olli Vänskä-violin

www.turisas.com

This is, as the bandname says, a company of ex Whitesnakemembers plus some others. The released only this album and a livealbum in 2001. The music was very inspired by early Whitesnake's blueshardrock and there are some really good songs on the album and the wellsung and strong vocals really suits the music.

Micky Moody and Bernie Marsden had played with Whitesnake in the bands early years releasing some classic and very good hardrockalbums. Micky has since 2000 released soloalbums and has played with a large number of well known artist. He has in fact played on over 100 albums, the first with Tramlene as early as 1968! Bernie has also played with many artists and is featured on albums by for example Wild Turkey, Babe Ruth, Alaska and solorecordings. Neil Murray had also played with Whitesnake and also Black Sabbath, Vow Wow, Michael Schenker Group, Colloseum II, Peter Green, Rondinelli and many more. John Lingwood has played with Leo Sayer and Manfred Mann's Earth Band. Stefan Berggren is from Sweden and I don't know anything more  about him.

1)Ayresome Park (-) 

2)Labour of love (7,0)

3)Ride, ride, ride (7,5)

4)Burst the bubble (7,5)

5)Sacrificial feelings (8,0)

6)What love can do (6,0)

7)Little Miss Happiness (7,0)

8)Hurricane (7,5)

9)Kinda wish you would (7,5)

10)Days to remember (7,0)

11)Back to the blues (9,0)

12)All dressed up (7,5)

13)Can't go back (7,5)

14)She (7,5)

15)Ayresome Park-reprise (-)

Score: 7,42

Stefan Berggren-vocals

Micky Moody-guitars (b.1950)

Bernie Marsden-guitars (b.1951)

Neil Murray-bass (b.1950)

John Lingwood-drums (b.1951)

Yet another Motörheadalbum that sounds like...Motörhead! This is a band that sticks to their roots and see no reason to change their winning concept. The album is well produced, the playing as good as ever and the songs are good all through even if it looses some of it's quality towards the end but it's absolutely not bad! Before Lemmy founded Motörhead in 1975 he was a member of Hawkwind. Phil Campbell has been with Motörhead since 1984 and Mikkey Dee since 1992. Mikkey earlier played with King Diamond and Don Dokken.

1)Runaround man (7,5) A typical Motörhead dieseloozin' rocker.

2)Teach you how to sing the blues (8,0) A heavy and bluesy rocker that rolls on and on and it's good stuff!

3)When the eagle screams (7,0) Midtempo song but Motörhead crushes anyway.

4)Rock out (8,0) Bulldozer-Motörhead! Fast and furious.

5)One short life (7,5) Slow and heavy as hell.

6)Buried alive (7,5) Double bass-drum inferno the Motörhead way!

7)English rose (7,5) A 60's kind of rocker. The Motörhead way!!

8)Back on the chain (7,0) Motörhead-boogie! Good chorus but the guitarsolo stinks.

9)Heroes (7,5) Midtempo, great solo!

10)The time is right (7,0) Rock'n'roll!

11)The thousand names of god (7,0)

Score: 7,23

Lemmy-vocals, bass (b.1945)

Phil Campbell-guitars (b.1961)

Mikkey Dee-drums (b.1963)

www.imotorhead.com  

This is a very secret band since I don't find much information about them. Seems like they are from California, USA and consists of Caleb on guitars and Ashton on drums and takes in various people for the rest of the instruments and also female vocals that can be heard on the album.  

Their music is a heard-before and right now popular kind of 70's inspirated spaced-out rock with the heaviness of 90's stonerrockers Kyuss. Also Black Mountain comes to mind. The albums consists of only 8 real songs and the running-time is only 27 minutes so that's a big minus. I really don't think these guys care much about that, they probably want to play music, lie on the beach, be cool and get chicks all day long and to earn some money by putting out some music now and then. 

Score: 5,71

www.tweakbird.com

Zakk Wylde was only 19 when he joined Ozzy Osburne as the bands guitarrist. He played with Ozzy for nearly 20 years and released a number of albums with his band Black Label Society which he started in 1998. BLS plays what Zakk says, no bullshit rock'n'roll. I'd like to describe it as beer- and boozeaffected heavy-as-hell bikermetal, the way heavy metal should be played. This album is the best I've heard with BLS. The bassist James LoMenzo has played with White Lion for some years He left BLS in 2005. Nick Catanese is an original member of BLS and has another band, Speed X, which has released an album.

1)Fire it up (8,0) Heavy as hell!

2)What's in you (8,5) Even heavier!

3)Suicide messiah (9,0) Heaviest there is and a superb track.

4)Forever down (8,0) Balladintro that bursts into a damn good and as usual heavy but melodic song.

5)In this river (7,5) A wonderful ballad dedicaded to Zakk's good friend Pantera's Dimebag Darrell that was shot on stage in 2004. A little too repetitive refrain though. Ozzy appears on guestvocals.

6)You must be blind (5,0) A very strange track with the same riff all the time. Don't like it.

7)Death march (7,0) Just a normal song.

8)Dr. Octavia (-) Fill-out guitarmadness.

9)Say what you will (8,0) A good uptempo rocker.

10)Too tough to die (7,0) Midtempo, nothing special.

11)Electric hellfire (7,0)

12)Spread your wings (8,0) Back to the heavy and good stuff!

13)Been a long time (8,0)

14)Dirt on the grave (7,5)

15)I never dreamed (9,0) A wonderful cover of the old Lynyrd Skynyrd-song from the 70's. Perfect ending to the album.

Score: 7,68

Zakk Wylde-vocals, guitar, piano (b.1967)

Nick Catanese-guitar

James LoMenzo-bass

Craig Nunenmacher-drums

www.blacklabelsociety.com