Back in the early 90s, the Gioeli Brothers (vocalist Johnny and guitarist Joey) attracted the attention of Journey guitarist Neal Schon. After drafting in Bad English drummer Deen Castronovo and forming Hardline, the band’s debut album ‘Double Eclipse’ was well received by the melodic rock community. It took a full decade until a follow up belatedly appeared and another eight years for the third Hardline album to materialise. You could say that Hardline make Metallica and Guns N’ Roses appear rather prolific. 2016’s ‘Human Nature’ – the band’s fifth studio album – reinstates guitarist Josh Ramos, absent for 2012 offering ‘Danger Zone’. This is something that will undoubtedly please fans, but it does mean that Hardline have featured a different line up on each release. There are some that have long thought that, in this repect, the band are basically Johnny Gioli and whomever he can find at the time of recording – and they’d probably be right – but if Johnny says it’s Hardline, then Hardline it is.
Tag Archives: aor
PALACE – Master Of The Universe
Michael Palace made his entrance into the melodic rock world early in 2016 when he contributed some fine guitar work to the second First Signal album. Several months on and with a new band in tow, his eponymous band’s debut teams him up with musicians who’ve played on other AOR projects from Find Me, Houston and even Erika Norberg.
CRUZH – Cruzh
Having never scoring a record deal or recording anything of note, Swedish glam rockers TrashQueen called it a day in 2015. Two thirds of the band then decided it was time to try a different style of rock music…and so bassist Dennis Butabi Borg and guitarist Anton Joensson formed Cruzh with vocalist Tony Andersson. The new band shunned the previous sleaze and glam sound in favour of AOR and melodic rock…music also not popular since 1990. If swimming against the tide were an Olympic sport, these guys would get a gold medal.
FIRST SIGNAL – One Step Over The Line
In 2010, Harem Scarem vocalist Harry Hess teamed up with Frontiers Records hired hand Daniel Flores to form First Signal, a band clearly more devoted to traditional AOR sounds than Harem Scarem had often been since their debut release in 1991. The results, while never outright classic, were very strong. With Hess returning to Harem Scarem duties almost instantly, First Signal seemed as if it would be a one-shot deal. But then, in the late spring of 2016, they returned.
NAKED – End Game
Take a computer graphic from 1983. Use it to create the outline of a naked woman. Call the band Naked. To be honest, that doesn’t really get things off to the best start, but could possibly be forgiven if the music within this album was of a high standard. Which it isn’t. As it is, most the tunes on this Swedish band’s debut release sound very tired.