[Heeplist] Trouble review

[BARNES IAN]

Great review Tapio, thanks. I've only played Trouble once so not ready to
offer too many thoughts as of yet. On the first track I thought I was
listening to John Sloman so glad you picked up on that too.  I don't know
much about the lead singer but he's got a decent voice. Sounds like Glenn
Hughes at times as you also mentioned. On first play its a good album and
after one play I have more positives about Trouble than I had with Faster.
I could hear traits of the BOTHighway album and sounds from the Faster
album. I wish Ken sang lead on more songs but I'm sure he knows his own
limitations nowadays.

Iain

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------------------------------
*From:* "Tapio Minkkinen" <tapio at uriah-heep.fi>
*To:* "heeplist at travellersintime.com" <heeplist at travellersintime.com>
*Sent:* 9 October 2013 13:04
*Subject:* [Heeplist] Trouble review

I received the CD yesterday and here's a review after playing the
album 4 - 5 times through:

KEN HENSLEY & LIVE FIRE: TROUBLE

READY TO DIE - Powerful opening, chorus reminds a bit of Playing To
Win by Little River Band. One of my favourite songs on the CD. There?s
some great guitar work by Ken Ingwersen all through the song and the
solo.

TROUBLE - The lines in the lyrics like "Trouble with my bicycle,
trouble with my hair", "Trouble, trouble, trouble" etc. sound a bit
stupid at first listen but I like this song more now that I've heard
it a few times. There's similar kind of slower and partly instrumental
section in the middle like on "The Curse" on Faster. The first song is
more guitar driven and I can't hear much Hammond but on this song
keyboards are more up on the mix and there's a very nice solo in the
end.

IT - There's a great build up in the beginning: It starts with some
nice bass lines and then the drums and guitars come in, then Ken comes
in. This song is more peaceful and melodic than the first two and the
main thing that carries it through is Ken's Hammond, the melody that
the plays reminds a bit of of "One Tender Moment" on A Glimpse Of
Glory. The song is seven minutes long of which the last four minutes
are instrumental and Ken's soloing on Hammond is fantastic, he really
lets loose here and it's great that this kind of thing is included on
a studio CD when usually it's only concerts where you hear keyboard
solos like this. This part with is my favourite on the CD and and the
three first songs are all among my favourites but after that the
quality unfortunately drops a bit.

TODO LOCO - A bit dull, I wouldn't say it's a bad song but it's not
that interesting - starting from the title that means in English
"Everything is crazy". It starts slowly with first just guitar and
keyboards and then vocals. After a while it becomes more powerful and
gets heavier but the chorus is a bit let down, if the chorus was
better this would be more enjoyable as there's some good parts.

I WANNA GO BACK - This is also nothing special, just an uptempo
melodic pop rock song. The lyrics seem to  be about all the girls Ken
has "met" along his tours over the years. Considering he is married
now and been together with his wife for over ten years this seems a
strange topic to a song but I guess it's natural to long back to the
old days.

PLEASE EXPLAIN - This is again one of my favourites. This is similar
to "Beyond The Starz" on Faster, it begins with only Hammond and then
there's the same kind of hypnotic feel to the song and there's a good
strong chorus. I really like this one, probably my nr. favourite at
the moment.

YOU WILL ALWAYS BE MINE - This is the first of the ballads on the
album. This song actually was created originally back in 2009 here in
Finland at Ken's songwriting class the first Easy Livin' In Salo event
together with those who attended it. Lyrics and melodies were mostly
written by Finnish Heep fan Liisa Tolonen but I don't think much was
left of that to this finished version. There was a video clip in
Youtube recorded when this song was performed for the first time after
it was written, I can try and find that so I can compare these two
versions. This is a typical Hensley ballad and its OK but somehow it
doesn't appeal to me that much, Ken has written some better ballads
during his solo career, for example "I Cry Alone" on the previous album.

I DON'T KNOW - A peaceful beginning with just keyboards and vocals, a
slower tempo and lighter more melodic song but there's still some
power. In the end there's something I don't remember hearing on any
Hensley record: A spoken word part. I have never liked these kind of
things on songs and it would have been better if this hadn't been
included but still the song itself is among the better songs on the cd.

DANGEROUS DESIRE - It's good to have this kind of faster and more
rocking song at the end to lift things up a bit. The song is also
actually pretty good too, a simple rock song with a melody in chorus
that sticks to the head. Not much meaning in the lyrics but I think
it's good as a contrast to some more deeper lyrics.

THE LONGEST NIGHT - The second ballad and the only song where you can
actually hear Ken on lead vocals, on a few tracks he sings the second
vocals together with Tiranti but this is a duet where they share the
vocals. This is better than the other ballad but either this is as
good as some of the ballads Ken has written before.

So, there was it song by song. Overall I would say this sound really
good, it's heavy and there's a lot of Hammond Organ and the playing is
excellent. The songs also seem to more in the same style with each
other when on previous records in the last fifteen years that Ken has
pursued his new solo career I have felt that the albums have been put
together of songs written over a long period in time and that are
different in style. I don't know if it's the case but it could be that
he?s used most of the "old supply" and these are newer songs written
especially for Live Fire, at least so it seems to me. Musically this
is his strongest album so far. There is actually no weak songs
included here although a few of them I'm not that excited after a few
listens but perhaps these will grow when given time. Ken's song
writing and the sense of melody is still there. The CD has "only" 10
songs but the total playing time is still over 50 minutes so the songs
are quite long. I like that the songs are given more space to build
with this as there are long intros and long instrumental parts.

There's the good stuff, then the negative: The only thing I have to
complain so far is the vocals. The previous lead vocalist Eirikur
Hauksson and the bass player Sid Ringsby left earlier this year and
they were replaced by Italian Roberto Tiranti who both sings and plays
bass. Ken sings lead vocals only on one song and the rest is left to
Tiranti. I had doubts beforehand on how he would do as I wasn't that
convinced of his vocal abilities based on what I had heard him sing
before.

After hearing Trouble my opinion hasn't changed. He is an OK singer
but nothing more. I was worried about the Italian accent but that was
a positive surprise that he actually pronounced the words quite well,
either he has practiced well or Ken has done a lot of coaching on the
matter. Still that doesn't change the fact that as a singer he is not
of the same standard as Ken's songs, these are so good that they would
have deserved a better singer. Of several songs he sounds a bit like
Glenn Hughes and even like John Sloman at times but that's just the
problem: He sounds like someone else and he doesn't have his own sound
that could be recognized. If this was an album by a new upcoming band
or artist he would do just fine but as interpreter of Ken Hensley's
song he is just not good enouh.

Several times when listening to the album I find myself thinking: "How
good would this sound with Eirikur or Ken singing". One of the best
things on previous album Faster was that Ken's and Eirikur's voices
fit in really well together and they divived the lead vocals part
pretty equally. This solution would have been better also on this
album or Ken could in my opinion sing himself most of the songs even
if Tiranti sang them live, anyway only a couple of these will probably
ever be played live. But apparently Ken and the band are happy with
him and it seems Ken is not interesting in singing on Live Fire
albums. I hope the next record he released will be a real solo album
so we can enjoy his singing more.


-- 
TapioM.tapio at uriah-heep.fiwww.uriah-heep.fi



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