Released by: Frontiers Records
Release Date: April 15th, 2022
Genre: Rock
Links: https://www.facebook.com/ronnieromeroofficial/
Line Up:
Ronnie Romero – vocals
Srdjan Brankovic – guitars
Javi Garcia – bass
Andy C – drums
Alessandro Del Vecchio – keyboards
Additional Musicians:
Danny Gómez – lead guitar on “I Was Born To Love You”
Javier Reyes – lead guitar on “All Along The Watchtower”
Corina Minda – backing vocals on “All Along The Watchtower”
Tracklist:
Sin’s A Good Man’s Brother (Grand Funk Railroad)
Backstreet Love Affair (Survivor)
No Smoke Without a Fire (Bad Company)
I Was Born To Love You (Queen)
Play The Game Tonight (Kansas)
Carolina County Ball (Elf)
Girl On The Moon (Foreigner)
Gypse (Uriah Heep)
Voices (Russ Ballard)
All Along The Watchtower (Bob Dylan)
Since I’ve Been Loving You (Led Zeppelin)
Gah, cover albums are so stupid amirite? Artists should be in the studio making new music for our entertainment and whims dammit! Why oh why must so many of them waste their time and ours (not to mention our money) with yet another album of songs they didn’t even write? It’s just glorified, professional karaoke when you get right down to it! If that’s how you feel, you can stop reading this now, and seriously, pull that stick crammed up ya and enjoy life. I dig cover albums, especially when they’re done well and they’re not the same songs everyone else covers. It’s easy for the performer to record these types of albums as they’re probably tunes they’ve loved all their lives, and they’ll probably start their careers singing in their early lives in cover bands. It gives them a chance to take it easy for a bit. You don’t have to buy it, and I would imagine the artist isn’t necessarily banking their career on it.
Ronnie Romero, vocalist du jour right now has a new album out now entitled Raised On Radio featuring a stunning array of tracks spanning many incredible artists and styles that highlight his amazing voice. Romero hit the scene some time ago with the band Lords of Black and has proceeded to wow the Metal world with his fantastic voice with such bands as The Ferryman, Vandenberg, and of course Rainbow. I saw him perform a few years ago at ProgPower with Lords of Black, twice actually, with one set a side of covers, so it was no surprise to see something like this come from him. I was impressed with the track list of this album. If Romero picked the tracks out himself, he did a fantastic job of not only picking out songs that fit his voice perfectly but selected tracks that weren’t the same ones you find on every other cover album. I mean, seriously, Foreigner “Girl On the Moon” and Russ Ballard “Voices?” Who in the hell covers those songs? Ronnie Fucking Romero that’s who! My personal favorites are “Sin’s A Good Mans Brother” from Grand Funk Railroad, “I Was Born To Love You” from Queen, and “Since I’ve Been Loving You” from Led Zeppelin. The only one I didn’t love was the Jimi Hendrix classic “All Along the Watchtower” (sorry, I don’t consider it a Bob Dylan song since Hendrix owned it.) It kind of had a Judas Priest “Johnny B. Goode” vibe to it where they altered it too much and it lost its essence.
So there ya have it, folks, Ronnie Romero’s Raised On Radio is a firecracker of an album of brilliant covers, most of which aren’t your standard numbers from bands, and not even bands one would expect to hear covered. If for no other reason this album is worth having for that reason alone. However, except one track, there are some amazing vocals and musical performances on here well worth the price.
Written by: Chris Martin
Ratings: 8/10
About Author
