Well the curtains have drawn and that is 2023 finished, over and done! It was certainly a swift year. I have endured a very bizarre phase in my life throughout 2023 and it's been very wavy.

Once again Frontiers has come up trumps with another exciting collaboration with Great White’s Jack Russell and guitar wizard Tracii Guns from L.A. Guns. 2024 just got of to a cracking start with some excellent new music.

As a founder member of Survivor back in 1978, and prior to that The Ides of March in the early 70’s, songwriter and musician Jim Peterik knows how to make a successful album. ‘Roots & Shoots Vol. 1’ will be his fifth with World Stage, following on from their self-titled debut in 2000.

So, we have a compilation of the different covers the guys have done throughout the years all on one package, a lot of these tracks have been on various bonus editions of the albums, so some were easier to hear than others, let's dig in!

Lord Of The Lost was formed in Hamburg, Germany during 2007 by Chris Harms as a solo project. While working on the initial songs and publishing them on ‘Myspace’, Harms received a lot of positive feedback, and realized that he would require a full band to play them live.

This 3-CD and 1 DVD/Blu-Ray package (also available on vinyl/DVD) is a record of a series of three live shows undertaken by Canadian rock legend Bryan Adams and his band at London’s Royal Albert Hall in 2022.

Therion have returned to conclude their most recent trilogy of albums with the most nostalgic and heaviest effort to date with Leviathan III

Fast approaching their fiftieth anniversary, due in 2025, Saxon have been a mainstay of rock in this country, their unwavering devotion to flying the flag of Heavy Metal making them loved throughout the globe.

You just wonder where the time goes, it's been 21 years since these guys first album, it doesn't seem like that long ago, album number nine for these guys, this album consisting of a couple of eps already released and the full version of the album appearing in December!

An American institution, Five Finger Death Punch practically bleed rawness in both their attitude and music and what you see is most definitely what you get.

Global straddling megastars The Police were just taking off when a shadowy, but oddly familiar, figure emerged from the wings. For all who saw him, it was no secret that Klark Kent was actually drummer Stuart Copeland on a branch from the day job, the worry as to whether the Copeland, Summers and Sting triumvirate would actually break through into the mainstream.

Formed in 2010 in Dereham, Norfolk, and influenced by the likes of Led Zeppelin, The Black Crowes, and Lynyrd Skynyrd, Bad Touch have grown and developed their ‘Down ‘n’ Dirty’ style of rock ‘n’ roll, and in doing so becoming a “Must See” band.

Now onto their third album, Buffalo quartet Hearts & Hand Grenades have certainly earned their stripes and anyone who witnessed their UK tour in the Summer will attest to their feral power as a live act.

C Bone. A name I had not come across until this CD popped through my letterbox. Based in the south west of England C Bone describes himself as a beach blues busker/festival funkster.

November is all about nostalgia for The Almighty and their fans. With three gigs announced earlier this year which we have been told will be the final hurrah for the band and to promote these two re releases, it is a very exciting time for the fans who have already sold out two of the three shows and with these two albums for the remainder who cannot make it.

Mississippi MacDonald doesn't just sing the blues, he doesn't just play the blues, he knows and feels the blues. If a listener unfamiliar with the blues asked this reviewer what the blues was I would hand them a copy of this album and say 'Give this a listen, this IS the blues'.