Exodus - Bonded By Blood

It's thrash metal, and it's one of the best. Fast. It's a cornerstone of thrash and was very influential, but never one of my favorites.

-Turns out this album gets better and better as it progresses.

Suicidal Tendencies - Suicidal Tendencies

Classic.

Fraction - Moon Blood

Somber psyche tinged hard rock. The singer sets this one apart from the average. At his worst he's a whimpy hippie. At his best he's a drunk howling Jim Morrison. I like the guitar playing on here quite a bit as well. If you like early Stooges type rawness. Yeah, Stooges meets the Doors at church hippy picnic. There's something that's "messed up" about this. That may be the factor that makes this album stand out.

Favorites Reviewed 2010 February

Entombed - Wolverine Blues (1993)
Black Pyramid - Black Pyramid (2009)
Thunder And Roses - King Of The Black Sunrise (1969)
The Knack - Get The Knack (1979)
Aerosmith - Rocks (1976)
Aerosmith - Draw The Line (1977)
Aerosmith - Night In The Ruts (1979)
Dokken - Tooth And Nail (1984)
Dokken - Under Lock And Key (1985)
Kiss - Unmasked (1980)
Jerry Lee Lewis - Live At The Star Club (1964)
The Rolling Stones - Aftermath (1966)
Steamhammer - Reflections (1969)
The Deviants - Ptooft!
Montrose - Rock The Nation
Electric Prunes - Underground (1967)
The Litter - $100 Fine (1968)
Finchley Boys - Finchley Boys (1972)
Dirty Blues Band - Stone Dirt (1968)
Bulbous Creation - You Won't Remember Dying (1970)
Black Merda - Black Merda (1970)

Metallica

May Blitz - 2nd Of May

Hard rockin' and Third Stone From The Sun type jam outs. Groovyness and dark trippyness.
Killer!
Good production. A couple of mello songs that bring to mind Pink Floyd or Black Sabbath. Sometimes Spinal Tap comes to mind too. An English Spinal Tap at their peak.
Killer!

Favorites Reviewed 2010 January

The Pretty Things - Get The Picture (1965)
Bob Dylan - The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan (1963)
Jan & Dean - Drag City (1963)
Killing Floor - Killing Floor (1969)
Black Cat Bones - Barbed Wire Sandwich (1969)
Index -Index (1967)
The Wounded Kings - Shadow Over Atlantis (2010)
Green And Wood - Green And Wood (2009)
Kreator - Pleasure To Kill (1986)
High On Fire - Blessed Black Wings (2005)
Assorted Heap - Mindwaves (1992)
John Mayall - Plays John Mayall

July - July

Psychedelic rock! Better than The Magical Mystery Tour. A lot of this stuff sounds ahead of it's time. Some of these songs would fit right in on a Beck CD 30 years later. Little bit of a pop thing going on here.

Fun Facts: After this album, one of the guitar players left. The remaining members of the band started a new band called Jade Warrior. Here's some history on the band.

Josefus - Josefus + Dead Man

Two albums on one CD here. Psychedelic hippy hard rock. Lots of guitar rockin'. Second album is heavier.

The official Josefus website.

Blodwyn Pig - Ahead Rings Out

Sounds like it could be a John Mayall record. Eclectic bluesy jazzy rock with horns and guitar.
The official Mick Abrahams/Blodwyn Pig website.

Bliss - Bliss

Ride the ship of fools
Carry your dreams
Like a Carpenter
Carries his tools
Hippy hard rock that rocks pretty good. You know, like Grand Funk Railroad or Cream.

Fist - Back With A Vengeance

Raw Judas Priest early Sammy Hagar Tank. If Def Leppards' little brothers started a metal band. There's a ton of cool metal stuff on here that 80's metal bands would go on to make un-cool, but believe me it's cool when Fist do it.

-Not unlike early Dokken, if Don Dokken was tougher.
Fist Wikipedia.

Nuclear Assault - Game Over

Thrash that's good. Punk regular guy type vocals. Kill Em All type thrash.
The official Nuclear Assault website.

Dust - Dust

Hippy hard rock that sometimes has a southern thing going on. It gets heavy too. It gets extended rock jam too. Good one.

Fun Facts: Marky Ramone was in this band before he was Marky Ramone.
Dust Wikipedia.

Deep Purple - In Rock

Heavy Duty rockin' with keyboards. Killer guitar and a singer that screams.

Official Deep Purple Website.

Damnation Of Adam Blessing - Second Blessing

Heavy Psyche!
Awesome album.

Damnation of Adam Blessing MySpace.

Clark Hutchinson Band - Retribution

Ted Nugent meets Grand Funk Railroad at the peace rally and scares all the hippies away. Later that night the guitar player sits in for an after hours jam at the blues club. Five long songs to show off the guitar players diverse talents of rock. Maybe some Zappa influence here too.
Clark Hutchinson YouTube Channel.

Elias Hulk - Unchained

1970

Raw sometimes dark hippy hard rock.

Fun Facts: These guys are threatening to put out a new album in 2010!

Granicus - Granicus

They've got the Led Zeppelin thing going on. Singer reminds me of the guy from Budgie, who reminds me of Robert Plant.

Strawberry Alarm Clock - Incense And Peppermint

These guys get a bad rap as one hit wonders, but this is a solid album. They have more in common with The Doors than The Monkees. Streched psychedelic pop focused wonderings.
Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds.
None of the other songs on the album are as bright and cheery as the hit single Incense And Peppermint. The other songs are more "serious". Like drivin' down the Pacific Coast Highway with the top down. Are these guys from southern California?

Favorites Reviewed 2009 December

Black Elk - Black Elk (2006)
Kyuss - Wretch (1991)
Fleetwood Mac - English Rose (1969)
The Who - Sings My Generation (1965)
Fleetwood Mac - Fleetwood Mac (1968)
Reverend Bizarre - In The Rectory Of (2002)
John Mayall Bluesbreakers - With Eric Clapton (1966)

Jericho - Jericho

Hard rockin' that sometimes gets a little nutty like late model Melvins meets Deep Purple hold the keyboards. There's also a big extended grand song like Pink Floyd meets ELO. The album ends with a rocker that sounds like a progressive semi unstructured Who jam/song under constuction.

-This has been gettin' lots of play in the car lately. Hard rockin' Deep Purple meets Pink Floyd progness.

Alice Cooper - Easy Action

Psychedelic oddness jams. A good one for the kids trippin' out in their dorm rooms.

Writing On The Wall - Power Of The Picts

Deep Purple Meets Pink Floyd at Jesus Christ Superstar. This stuff is crazy rock. It will take more than one listen with this. I hate to call anything progressive, but this may be one of the better examples of something that can be "progressive" and still be good, because it rocks. The have some organ sounds that may remind you of Traffic.

The End - Introspection

1969

Laid back psychedelic rock. Introspection is a good name for this. Wussies.

Zombies - Odessey And Oracle

Kinks like post Sgt. Peppers/Pet Sounds pop goodness. Good songs. Good Album.