This is the second album from Irish band Maverick, the melodic hard rock apocalypse of today.
Of course, talking about melodic rock you should think of bands like Skid Row and Tyketto, since Maverick got more balls and grooves than cheesy choruses. I wouldn’t call them sleazy, I’d say they are way more swaggery (sic) and their sound is more American than European. Out of the eleven songs on “Big Red” the ten are dynamite. The last one is a ballad, which is wisely placed as the album’s finisher so that it wouldn’t interrupt the album’s manic speed.
The more meldic moments on the album are “The One”, “Forever” (a great song) and “Whiskey Lover”. “Mademoisele” takes us right back to “Slave To The Grind”, while they certainly deserve credit for one of the coolest use of a French song title (Maiden and Megadeth still managed to make the best out of the world’s most non-metal language with “Déjà Vu” and “A Tout Le Monde”). “In The Night” has what it takes to become a hit in an ideal world, or if they could ride a time machine and get to late ‘80s. “Renegade” is the ultimate streetwise anthem and of course we shouldn’t forget that on “Asylum” they got Steve Stevens to lay down a solo and Poodles’ Jakob Samuel sharing lead vocals.
The bottom line is that David Balfour is a hell of a singer, the production sounds amazing and their guitars are perfect. Maverick know what they are doing and they do it well. They bring several stuff from the past in mind, but that’s not bad when the outcome is something so good as “Big Red”. Fans of cool hard rock should definitely check it out.
