UK band THREE LIONS were formed in 2012, and consist of experienced musicians with past histories in bands such as Dare and Ten. Their self-titled debut album was released in 2014 through Italian label Frontiers Music.
As one might expect with a band whose members have the background briefly outlined, this British band is one that have a main focus on what many would describe as melodic rock or AOR, radio friendly rock and hard rock of the kind that generally will have a fairly broad general reach. Music easy on the ears and the mind if you like, where the main danger among the artists exploring that sound is that the songs have a tendency to become too smooth and syrupy.
Three Lions does have a balancing act going in that department alongside just about every other artist creating material of this kind, but generally I find them to master it more often than failing. The songs are smooth, with keyboards smoothing out many edges, guitars toned down and with the lead vocals a dominant presence throughout, the sole exception for the latter being a delightful melancholic instrumental used to conclude the album.
This threesome manage to use the contrasting sounds of guitars and keyboards to good effect to maintain tension, opting for a darker guitar sound and lighter toned keyboards textures to create a natural contrast that is used to good effect, with subtle alterations in depth and intensity creating delicate fluctuations that manage to come across as compelling and interesting despite the relative smooth arrangements throughout, and there’s also a fair degree of variation among the individual tracks that helps maintain interest: The album as a whole alternates between softer floating keyboards and guitar oriented creations, more vintage oriented and powerful guitar and organ combinations and tracks revolving more distinctly around a harder edged, more dominant guitar presence without a distinct keyboard presence, seeing to it that the total album experience isn’t a case of experiences an album’s worth of songs hard to separate from one another.
As far as references go my main associations was bands like FM for the more careful of the songs here, while the more powerful ones made me think of UK band Magnum and the albums they released in the middle of the 1980’s. With a token exception, Hold Me Down, which comes across as something much closer to what Bryan Adams released 30 or so years ago for me. Another slightly odd one out is my standout track though, namely Kathmandu. The combination of guitar driven hard rock and Eastern inspired instrument details have been a surefire winner ever since Led Zeppelin penned Kashmir 40 or so years ago, and Three Lions is a quality addition to the list of bands that have successfully created a song of a similar general nature.
While Three Lions isn’t a band that will manage to interest an audience much beyond those with a taste for melodic rock or AOR, the fairly expansive audience with an interest in music of this kind should find this debut album to be one well worth spending time on. While I suspect that fans of both Dare and Ten should find the material to be of interest, personally I’d describe this album as one that should appeal most strongly to those who have UK bands FM and Magnum as their favorites, and then the music those bands created in the mid to late 1980’s in particular.
My rating: 77/100
