Partying is a sacred act in the heavy metal community; downing beers and staying up until dawn are as much a rite of passage as stealing your first Metallica record. Yet, in the past few decades, it has been hard pressing to find music in the genre that is unabashedly made to be the soundtrack of the debauchery. Gone are the days of party-rock melody lovers like Ratt; instead we have welcomed a new era where extremes in the precision of musical head crushing mean more than those of scoring chicks and not getting any sleep. Where did the good times go? High Spirits may be the answer to the question and the start of a new wave of American happy metal.
You Are Here is the bands follow up to 2011s stellar ball of energy Another Night; this time compelety written and played by front man Chris Black. “When the Lights Go Down” kicks the door off its hinges with the bubbling rock and roll sense abilities and metallic crunch of classic Annihilation Time. It’s Blacks crisp voice that ties the tune together reminiscent of Joe Elliot on early Def Leppard work.
The driving bass line on “I Need Your Love” drags the song into a full-on burner. As close to a contemporary version of classic Scorpions as we could possibly wish for, “Love” is a time-warp right down to the polished production; full, loud and bursting with life. Black gives birth to a forgotten eighties rock masterpiece with the instant classic “The Last Night” the albums rightful single. “We’ve gone too far tonight and it’s well past the deadline” Black cries to someone we can only imagine is a leather clad babe waiting with a bottle of Jack in her hand. God bless.
8/10
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