Though he released Live in Williamsburg back in 2014, it has been 44 years since guitar wizard Shuggie Otis released a studio album. Coming of age first with his father Johnny's wonderfully raucous R&B band and playing on sessions by T-Bone Walker and Big Joe Turner, Otis gained first notice from rock fans for his starring role on Kooper Session: Super Session, Vol. 2). He released three fine studio albums under his own name between 1970 and 1974 including the classic Inspiration Information. Here Otis leads a quintet that includes veteran rockers Carmine Appice (Vanilla Fudge, Beck, Bogert & Appice) and bassist Tony Franklin (the Firm, Roy Harper), keyboardist/producer Kyle Hamood (Them Guns), and guitarist Aaron Kaplan…
Rob Freeman and Ian McLintock never quite achieved rock stardom, but it wasn't for a lack of talent or effort, and their career together unwittingly serves as a superb example of the shifting tides of the British rock scene in the 1960s and early '70s. Freeman and McLintock's recordings get a thorough examination on Listen to the Sky, which follows the stylistic evolution of their bands over the course of a decade. Freeman (guitar and vocals) and McLintock (bass and vocals) first worked together in the Others, an R&B combo from Southwest London whose lone single, a cover of Bo Diddley's "Oh Yeah," was a well crafted rave-up in the manner of the Rolling Stones and the Pretty Things.
Enter Stratosphere, a tight knit Quintet that mixes symphonic progressive and melodic rock in a manner that will leave you speechless. The band is the brainchild of keyboard virtuoso Jeppe Lund, himself a huge fan of symphonic rock and he has dreamed of making a record such as Fire Flight. With Goran Edman on lead vocals; his clean, yet powerful voice is one of a kind. Goran blends perfectly in a loud music setting and excels on the neo-classical twist. Both his lead and backing vocal qualities are state of art. He has become a household name singing with bands such as Kharma, Vindictiv and, of course, with Yngwie Malmsteen. To complete the line up we have guitarist Jonas Larsen, whose nifty fretwork reminds US of Yngwie himself and Richie Blackmore.
Tempest has a band name that might suggest a group of sneering, leather-wearing, head-banging metal heads, but the group's music is less threatening and more expansive than its name suggests. Tempest plays traditional Celtic music with a rock & roll intensity that's accented by a wide range of influences from the blues to American country music, Cajun 2-steps, and Arabic music, with some old-time San Francisco psychedelic flair…