In the minds of most people, Iain Matthews will always be best known as an early member of Fairport Convention, and for fronting his own folk rock band Matthews’ Southern Comfort in the early 1970s. His career stretches way beyond that, though, and is home to some much bigger musical treats.
Author Archives: Real Gone
HOWARD JONES – Live In Japan
The huge box set reissue of Howard Jones’s ‘Humans Lib’ was a real treat for fans. A multi format set, it presented the classic album with a wealth of bonus materials, including unreleased demos, alternate versions and radio sessions. The biggest draw, though, came from its visual content. The lavish set finally gave a DVD release to the long out of print ‘Live In Japan’ VHS, much to the delight of almost everyone.
Unfortunately, that box was both prohibitively expensive and a really limited run, meaning that only hardcore fans would get to see that footage in decent quality, and in some cases for the first time in many a long year. Luckily, the 2022 release ‘Live At The NHK Hall, 1984’ comes to the rescue, since it offers the same film at an affordable price, but improves upon the previous release by presenting it alongside an uncut version of the audio soundtrack.
Watch ‘Nightshift’, the new video from Bruce Springsteen
Considering how Bruce Springsteen has long been a devotee of the music from Phil Spector’s stable and many of his deeper album cuts convey the sounds of Detroit via their horns and storytelling, he’s taken a long time to get around to recording an album of soul covers. Perhaps that has much to do with him being a prolific songwriter himself – Bruce has effectively shelved albums and albums worth of material that many artists would consider top tier work – meaning that recording other peoples’ songs has never seemed like a priority.
PERFECT PLAN – Brace For Impact
In the year or so leading up to this third release from Perfect Plan, vocalist Kent Hilli kept himself more than busy. Considered by some to be the great white hope of melodic rock in the twenty first century, between 2021 and 2022, he not only issued two solo releases – an album of original material and an EP of covers – but also became the new frontman for AOR legends Giant, appearing on their very enjoyable ‘Shifting Time’ album, and even found time to contribute vocals to the second Restless Spirits album.
DETROIT REBELLION – Fake News
Back in 2013, Detroit Rebellion self-released their ‘Detroit Rebellion ’67’ EP, a four track blast of noisy garage blues delivered by two men who often valued pure grit over musical finesse. Continuing in the vein of the now missed Dead Exs and the perfect successor to their ‘Fork In The Road’ release, it showed how the rawness of a pure garage blues sound could often be relied upon to hit the spot, despite working to a fairly formulaic approach.
Some of the best tracks from those EPs were recycled for 2017’s full length release ‘The Man’, and when heard as part of a broader musical canvas, they lost none of their power. The duo continued to plough forward with 2018’s ‘See You Next Year’, channelling Morphine – sans saxophones – on ‘Snake Eyes’, conveying a really spooky edge on ‘Spit Fire’, and working their usual rowdy voodoo on ‘Wrong Number’, all of which suggested that, going forward, there would be even more mileage in their gritty sound.