Passion - 'Passion' Frontiers Music srl

This new album is getting a lot of love from most of the Rockfiend crew just now. The (used to have) hair-metallers love the 80s sleazy vibe; there’s enough AOR for the wimp-rockers and even our in-house guitar hero is getting off on the riff-tastic vibe, so something for everyone here.

Opening track ‘Intensity’ is, well…. pretty intense. It’s a riffy rocker in an 80s style with a great vocal from Lion Ravarez (aka Dan Rossall, formerly of Night By Night). Dan is having a good month – he’s written, played and produced this and has also got some writing credits on the current Revolution Saints album, including ‘When The Heartache Has Gone. There’s no doubting his AOR credentials then and ‘Trespass On Love’ and ‘Lost In The Dark’ are the best of the melodic tunes here.

I do have to caution that some of the lyrics are NSFS (not suitable for snowflakes) but teenage boys and 40-year old virgins will love it, as will anyone willing to put tongue in cheek for a bit of retro-sleaze. Check out ‘Too Bad For Baby’, ‘We Do What We Want’ and ‘Built To Please’ to hear what I mean. ‘She Bites Hard’ is an interesting one too – it sounds a bit like a Bon-era AC/DC cut sung by Vince Neil (when he was good).

Lion/Dan seems to have recruited some other players, so it looks like this is going to be a ‘real’ band not just a project. I hope so, it’s one of the most enjoyable releases of the year so far.