The UK guitar legend Bernie
Marsden with history in Withesnake, UFO,
Wild Turkey, Babe Ruth and Cozy Hammer's
Hammer, Alaska and many more bands
releases a new studio album with big
brush strokes of blues rock. With guests
like Joe Bonamassa, David Coverdale, Ian
Paice and Don Airey you can inhale the
musical fog on this disc. Mature and
grown up rock n roll with beautiful
melodies and charming guitar playing.
The drums on this album are played by
Jeff Beck's drummer Jimmy Copley, and on
the base, we find Mark Feltham, who also
makes a beautiful harmonica solo on the
slow blues song "Lady Friend" btw.
'Shine' is recorded in the
classic Abbey Road Studios with producer Rob
Cass as the overall sound artist. Bernie
has been in the same studio earlier when Whitesnake played in the super hit 'Here
I Go Again'. Sound-wise, this is really
good, but it's not just the sound that
is great on this album. It's top-notch
quality throughout all the thirteen
songs, where we offered lead heavy blues
tracks such as: 'Bad Blood' featuring
Cherry Lee Mewis, opening track 'Linin'
Track 'and' Hoxie Rollin 'Time'.
Beautiful, silky songs like the closing
song 'NW8'.
Personally I like it best when
David Coverdale is the guest vocalist.
He sings on the heavy track "Trouble"
and you would think that they moved back
to Whitesnake's heyday, this is a
delightfully bluesy rock song with
David's characteristic vocals. And, yes
!! It is a cover of the old Whitesnake
classic, but it sounds incredibly fresh
and new!
I especially like: 'Walk Away', ZZ Top boogie-rock groove in 'Kinda
Wish
She Would', and the aforementioned Coverdale guest performance in
"Trouble", the smooth AOR song 'Who do
We Think We are?', which is a nice
melodic song with emotional depths, the
title track 'Shine' with Bonamassa and the
wonderfully airy and 70s fragrant 'Dragonfly' are my favourites.
This is a surprisingly strong
album from the old guitar giant and I recommend
it to all hard rock lovers with
taste for the bluesy direction to get a
copy of Bernie's 'Shine' immediately!!
Good stuff!!
