Brazilian death metal outfit Rebaelliun released two albums before breaking up in 2002, then reforming in 2015 and soon afterwards releasing their third with exactly the same line-up that played on the second, 14 years earlier. Since then, Ronald Lima left and fellow...

For some years, one of the most popular gigging bands in Auckland were Fire For Glory, but having been through some line-up changes they decided to have a reset. I saw them play as FFG, but the next time I saw the same four guys they were Stray Dogs and having signed...

I have always enjoyed albums where it is possible to discover unknown bands. The first I purchased was ‘Private Pleasures’ in 1978 which introduced me to then unknown band such as Dire Straits, City Boy, Graham Parker, Bethnal, British Lions and others. I was also the...

Coming across Alice in the Seventies was nothing short of a revelation, and like many of my generation we had all his early albums while his first live release, 1977’s ‘The Alice Cooper Show’, is undoubtedly one of the finest concert albums ever released. ‘Road’ is...

The complete credit for this album is Charlie Apicella & Iron City meet The Griots Speak, and the concept was to bring together two sets of musicians (Charlie is common in both bands), consisting of straight-ahead players in one and free improvisors in the other...

Here we have the latest release from jazz guitarist Doug MacDonald and his trio. ‘Edwin Alley’, named after a historic location in Old Town Pasadena, where the trio perform regularly on Thursday nights, is the follow-up to ‘Serenade To Highland Park’. That album had...

Back in 2015 I was fortunate enough to attend The Big Nui festival, and one of the bands I saw that day impressed me tremendously was Albi & The Wolves, who were a quartet who had formed just the year before. Running the sound for that festival, as well as being...

Last year I reviewed the six-track EP ‘Influence’ by Kirsty Dewar, and now she has returned with her debut album and a slight change in name. Two of the songs from that EP, “Influence” and “Dance With Your Shadows”, have been revisited and are here along with another...

The Larry Normans formed at the turn of the century and went through the usual revolving door of musicians before releasing their debut album back in 2005. They gigged hard and played festivals such as Big Day Out until 2010 when they went on hiatus and members Andrew...

In some ways Marduk have been incredibly stable in that founder guitarist Evil (Morgan Steinmeyer Håkansson) has been at the helm for more than 20 years while singer Mortuus (Daniel Rostén) joined all the way back in 2004 but in other areas not so much. Drummer...

According to such notable magazines as Rolling Stone and GQ, the worst song of all time is Starship’s “We Built This City”, so one can only wonder what they would think of the title track which opens this album, played in the background in a twisted manner with plenty...