Lita Ford – Living Like a Runaway album review
Released on: SPV / Steamhammer. Release date:
Available now.
After
finding herself in a desperate situation in her personal life, where it
basically sounds like Lita Ford was literally running for her life from her
ex-husband Jim Gillette (Nitro) and sadly, having to leave her two kids too, she has moved on and forward and done well!
Gillette
was the main driving force behind Lita’s last terrible release, ‘Wicked
Wonderland.’
The good
news is, through it all, Lita has come up with a very good album indeed that
firmly puts that disastrous last effort in it’s rightful place … The rubbish
bin or sorry to my American readers, garbage bin!
Her new album, 'Living Like A Runaway' really has so much going for it and folks, you should check it out!
Opening
track ‘Branded’ is seriously heavy, edgy, almost punky – ala Runaways – and
dark, but it rocks and after a while it does become a grower … Believe me, give
it a chance!
Next up,
‘Hate’ sounds as mean as the song implies and follows same kind of edge of the
albums opener.
Love the
walking bass on this in places that follows the general groove, although some
of Lita’s vocals, when she takes the punky attitude.
‘The Mask’
is next, and it starts in a creepy manner as she talks through a voicebox …
Then when
she really gets into the song, her vocal performance is great.
Yes, I am at
times thinking Ann Wilson (Heart), sings Joan Jett!
The album
has without doubt got a great production about it, thanks to a certain Gary
Hoey, a great player in his own right, who also co-wrote a lot of the material
on this release.
The other co-writer here is Michael Dan Ehming, who along with Hoey, has really helped with this album's material.
Lita is
really giving it her all here and with the title track, ‘Living Like A Runaway’
next, this song has really got my attention and I often find myself walking
around and then the chorus comes into my head and I start singing it to myself.
Class song
and killer guitar solo. It’s actually – and forgive me for this Lita – got a
little Heart / U2 / Bon Jovi / Bryan Adams about it.
I'll bet, any one of those acts, wishes they'd written this number, it's great and seriously
catchy!
‘Relentless’
is another strong song, with at times an almost Def Leppard vibe about it, but
it sounds a seriously strong sung song and I absolutely adore the guitar work
on this. The harmonizing guitar will win me over anytime! Excellent!
The
heartfelt message to her kids that is the ballad ‘Mother’ is again, very strong
and tells the situation just like it is, of the pain she has gone through and
no doubt the children too.
‘Devil In
My Head’ is Lita doing her take on a dirty Black Sabbath type vibe. Heavy and
dark indeed!
With next
track ‘Asylum’ there’s a more thoughtful, almost borderline prog metal with
melodic overtones.
‘Love 2
Hate U’ starts acoustically but then gets into a great hard rocking groove and
is an absolute winner for me!
Final
track – On this version, there’s a deluxe version out there with two bonus
tracks. – ‘A Song to Slit Your Wrist’s By,’ – Ed: Nice …! - was written by
Motley Crue’s Nikki Sixx …
It’s a
little weird, as it starts as a kind of semi-processed sound, synths, distorted
guitar in a kind of ‘intro’ style fashion, but then the tune gets into a sub-ZZ
Top type groove, but quite heavy. There’s some serious riffing in places, but
it’s a very different kind of groove to the rest of the album.
Basically,
overlooking some of the negative song titles and some of the subject matter –
She has been through a rough time! – it’s a very good album. Certainly night and
day against that disaster that was ‘Wicked Wonderland.’
Do yourselves
a favour and go check this out, Lita's back and playing well … Nice input from
Gary
Hoey and Michael Dan Ehming too though!
Catch her on the road this summer too, opening for Def Leppard and Poison, here in North America.
Official website:
No comments:
Post a Comment