BLACK BONZO: Sound Of The Apocalypse

Choice Of The Month August 2007
Cover	Release	Style
	2007-06-27	classic / progressive rock
	Label
	www.lasersedgegroup.com
	Website
	www.blackbonzo.com
	Contact
	-
	Playing Time	Cat. N°
	54:03	LE1048
	Review by	Rating
	Edwin	9/10
nederlands	Review
I’ve lost count of just how many Swedish retro rock bands I have heard since I started reviewing for Prog/Metal-Nose a couple of years ago. Some of them are just plain poor, others are fine, and some are even excellent. BLACK BONZO is definitely among the latter. Their debut album, Lady Of The Light, was a joy to listen to. The band sounded like URIAH HEEP reincarnated, with touches of other classic rock bands like QUEEN, KANSAS and PROCOL HARUM. The album received very good reviews and this no doubt helped the band to find a home for the second album at The Laser’s Edge label. In my review of the debut album, I called it a URIAH HEEP pastiche, but this can in no way be said about Sound Of The Apocalypse. Sure, there are still many references to HEEP and other classic rock and prog bands, but the band has clearly managed to develop a sound of their own. That doesn’t mean that this album sounds any more modern, though. Just like its predecessor, it sounds as if it could have been recorded way back in the seventies. But then that’s just the thing I like! Prog fans tend to judge the quality of a band by how well they cope in the long songs. Well, BLACK BONZO doesn’t have anything to worry about: the title track, the longest song on the album at just over 13 minutes is just brilliant, with enough going on to make any progger happy. This one and ‘Thorns Upon A Crown’ may stand out, but there really aren’t any bad songs here. ‘Yesterday’s Friends’ and ‘Iscariot’ are among my other favourites. The lyrics are quite good as well, by the way. Prominent throughout the album are the analog keyboards of Nicklas Ahlund: Hammond, mellotron… Magnus Lindgren has an excellent, warm and emotional voice, and the fact that he doesn’t have that annoying accent so many of his compatriots have when singing in English, makes listening to him an even greater pleasure. I’m also quite pleased with the non-spectacular, but very efficient guitar work and the inclusion of other instruments like saxes and flutes. As I mentioned above, Sound Of The Apocalypse sounds as if it was recorded in the 70’s. The big difference with all those other retro-sounding cd’s is that BLACK BONZO’s album would have been among the better products even at the time. Another fantastic album by this Swedish band! Can’t recommend this enough.
Musicians
Nicklas Ahlund: keyboards Mike Israel: drums Joakim Karlsson: guitars Anthon Johansson: bas Magnus Lindgren: vocals
Tracklist
Thorns Upon A Crown Giant Games Yesterday’s Friends The Well Intermission – Revelation Song Ageless Door Iscariot Sound Of The Apocalypse


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