Tuesday, September 18, 2012

Julian Angel's BEAUTIFUL BEAST: "California Suntan"

Rating: RRRR
Label: Platinum Blonde Records 2012
Review by Kimmo Toivonen

Julian Angel continues his mission to take us all back to the year 1989. With the second Beautiful Beast album he succeeds quite well, the songs are better, the artwork's better... In my first review I nagged about the vocals, but I won't do it this time. Julian might not be the best singer in the world, but he sings better than before and his style suits these songs.

"Wet Wild Willing" kicks off the album with some furious guitar acrobatics. The song itself wouldn't sound out of place on a Reckless Love album, it has the kind of positive party vibe and a catchy hook. The groovy, funky but nevertheless average "Dance Little Sister" would have been better off buried somewhere later in the tracklisting, but thankfully it's followed by a couple of album highlights. "Rock School" has a mighty fine hook and some nice keys, even though they're used in an almost apologetic way - "hey, I'm just going to put some keys here, but I'll use a non-intrusive sound and fade them right away"... Goddamn it, if you're going to tinkle the ivories, tinkle 'em proudly! The other highlight is the AOR-tastic "Cry, Cry, Cry". Nice!

"You Better Love Me" has Def Leppard written all over it, which isn't a bad thing at all, and "Fair Weather Friend" sounds like a vintage Glam ballad. The lyrics have a bit more thought put into them though, not the usual "my baby left me" stuff.

"Addiction To The Friction" are "Wet Hair In A Waterride" are both very decent glam rock tracks, but I'd rather skip "Friday To Sunday". It's another funky track, and I've never been able to really get that style, even though I've tried... "Something In The Air" is more my kinda thing, a balladic, melodic song with a big chorus. The "bonus track" "Gimme Just One Night" isn't half bad either.

So there. A good album that should appeal to the fans of 80'ies glam and melodic hard rock. The younger readers who are into the likes of Reckless Love, Jettblack and Crash Diet should give "California Suntan" a chance too.


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1 comment:

  1. definitely gonna pick this one up, reckless love is a great band and both their releases have been awesome.

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