Released by: Rat Pak Records

Release Date: Out Now!!!

Genre: Hard Rock

Line Up:

Jamie Brown vocals, guitar, piano
Joe Infante bass, vocals
John Butler guitar, vocals
David Landry drums

George Lynch guitars on “Super Bad” & “Go Fuck Yourself”
Dug Pinnick vocals on “Go Fuck Yourself”, bass on “Man in the Moon”
Ray Luzier drums on “Man in the Moon

Tracklist:

1. Someone To Kill
2.  Girl’s Alright
3.  Super Bad
4.  Thin Blue Line
5.  Broken Chandeliers
6.  Go Fuck Yourself
7.  Man in the Moon  Cover: The Scream
8.  Without Us
9.  Quarter To Four
10.  I Don’t Want to Live This Way
11.  First Mistake

As I edge closer to 50 I find myself reflecting back on my younger days. I’ve gotta say, the 80’s were a crazy time. It is definitely the heyday for the type of music I enjoy the most: Hard Rock/Metal. It seemed sometimes you couldn’t turn on the TV without some big-haired dude with caked on make-up baiting your sister to join him in the back seat of the car or flip on the radio to hear the anthem of the summer laced with soaring guitar licks and innuendo-laden lyrics. From 1985 until around 1991, you had your choice of Glam Metal, Thrash Metal, Heavy Metal, and the early beginnings of Progressive Metal (and of course a wide variety of more Hard Rock oriented music,) but those first two subgenres were King; especially Glam. 80’s Hard Rock (typically given the demeaning moniker Hair Metal that was selling short a great deal of talent from this style by relegating it to a certain look) ran the gamut through MTV and FM radio steadily for those years, some incredible and some flagrantly ripping off the genre in such a generic way it’s not even funny. Towards the end of the decade as Grunge and Alternative Rock started taking over and the hair fell down, the make-up washed away, and the spandex and blouses were given up for flannel there was such a glut of cookie-cutter bands (that phenomena continues to this day actually for whatever the current trend is) that you were kind of glad (to a degree) that it went the way of the Doo Doo. Every trend should die at some point.

One band that rode in on the flood of Glam bands in the 80’s was Roxanne, only they weren’t really cookie cutter. Their s/t debut came out and sold well enough thanks in part to the great reception of the song “Cherry Bay” and a rousing cover of “Play That Funky Music,” which even gave them National television exposure with their appearance The Late Show performing the aforementioned cover. For some reason, the label gave them terrible support which led to the quick demise of the band before they even had the chance to allow themselves to grow. Fast forward a remarkable 30 years and they’re back with their follow-up Radio Silence. Even though the band is still intact, musically they’re at a different point in their lives. Instead of relying on their 80’s Hard Rock sound from back in the day, they’ve more or less updated it, having more of a blues-ish meet more up-tempo Alt-Rock. No, this isn’t one of those wretched albums where a once catchy rock act decides to follow the next trend, but it bears little resemblance to their former selves. It’s easily a more mature sound. The addition of the guys from KXM (Dug Pinnick, George Lynch, and Ray Luzier) as guests on the tracks “Go Fuck Yourself,” “Super Bad,” and “Man In the Moon” (a cover of The Scream song) you initially think, “That seems weird,” until you hear the songs and realize that they do sort of have a KXM flavor about them (more melodic, not as heavy perhaps.) Other stand-outs are “Broken Chandeliers,” “Girls Alright,” and “I Don’t Want To Live This Way.”

If you go in expecting Radio Silence to pick up where the s/t left off, you will be unhappy. There are moments that you hear the same band, but as a whole, much like the members of the band, it’s a much more mature sound, and for me that works pretty well. I don’t know if this album will take them to the next level, but it is still a good, solid album. They’ve not created a stark, new sound to wow the masses, but it’s a good enough record that warrants some spins

Written by: Chris Martin