Leicester’s NWOBHM-ers take you on a trip back in time
Like everyone else who grew up in the 1980s and before, MV used to religiously listen to the Friday Rock Show. It is difficult, perhaps, to explain to those who didn’t live through those times how difficult it was to hear new music then. We can still recall the joy of being 10 or 11 in the middle of that decade with a portable radio, listening to bands we’d never heard of and in some cases, would become our favourites.
Chrome Molly have more reason than most to look back on those times with fondness. The Leicester mob did a session on that show and featured more than once. Active until the early 1990s, they reformed at the arse end of the last decade and stuck a comeback record out in 2013.
Now its time for number two and “Hoodoo Voodoo” is a wonderful throwback to the days when the New Wave Of British Heavy Metal was indeed new.
By way of proof, this even extends to a song about that very subject. “Pillars Of Creation (Albion)” is from the Saxon school of fist-pumpers, and essentially is a namecheck of the greats (and as an aside how good it is to see Status Quo – so often overlooked – right in the mix too.) and the other eight songs here (opener “In The Beginning” is merely an overture.) belong in that company.
“Can’t Be Afraid Of The Dark” is like a cross between early Maiden and Deep Purple, “Some Kind Of Voodoo” is even better, and is brilliantly British (“I used to wake up in the morning feeling lousy” sings Steve Hawkins in its first line) but also comes with a real slammer of a chorus.
“Indestructible” is another that knows how to rouse the rabble, but is slightly less rooted in the late 1970s/early 1980s vibe and “Save Me”, with its UFO-isms, is more the type of stuff that sees “Hoodoo Voodoo” excel. Similarly, “Rock For You” comes in with a chunky, leather clad, studded belt of a riff and is all the better for it, and “Feeling Pressurised” – by some distance the shortest, sleaziest thing here – is a three minutes of maelstrom.
In amongst all this, there are two songs that show the genuine class that Chrome Molly have always had. “Now That Those Days Have Gone” is a gorgeous ballad – and one with a country lilt to boot, and at the other end of the spectrum is the closing “Dial F For Freakshow” which is very much proof positive that you wouldn’t want to teach these old dogs new tricks and they can find trouble on their own just fine.
The world might have changed and there might be a million ways to consume music, but you know one thing that never changes? Heavy metal never goes out of fashion. And Chrome Molly have provided a fine album of it here.
Rating 8/10
