BONA FIDE

In my opinion one of the best albums to come out of 2002, and one of the best ever albums by Wishbone Ash to boot! Some great songs, excellent playing and sound production, "Bona Fide" is still a regular listen for me. The CD kick s off with the rocker "Almighty Blues", part of their live set, a very catchy song and contains a great guitar solo. "Enigma" , another catchy song with a memorable chorus, sounds very much like a typical early Wishbone Ash song, it has that traditional sound on the vocals and guitars, with a very good short slide guitar solo. The line-up on this album is Andy Powell guitars and vocals, Ben Granfelt on guitar, "smiling" Bob Skeat on bass and Ray Weston on drums. The next track "Faith hope and Love" is one of my favourites on the album, a very memorable song which could be autobiographical, it features twin guitars and organ, and contains a great guitar solo. This song is part of their live set and sounds fantastic. "Ancient Remedy" has a very catchy eastern-sounding guitar riff as a hook, interspersed with vocal passages, another favourite track of mine, good one to sing along to! another gem of a guitar solo. "Changing Tracks" is next, great heavy blues guitar, and a collection of blues song cliches! (jumping trains, chicago, texas etc.!). "Shoulda Woulda Coulda", i can't imagine anyone getting away with a song title like that! but they nearly do - the song has an almost reggae-style beat and works well, but i don't know about those lyrics though!! The title track "Bona Fide" is an instrumental, and has a traditional Ash-style boogie rhythm, not the strongest track on the album but has some nice twin guitar effects and solos. "Difference in Time" is very much another traditional sounding Ash song, it has some nice vocals and jangly twin guitars, as has "Come Rain Come Shine", a great song which includes some nice flute playing, i could almost imagine it could have even have been left off "argus", except near the end of the song it breaks into a mixture of sound effects, middle-eastern singing, bombs and american voices, then goes back into the song's main chorus. the last song "Peace" is another very good instrumental, slow and bluesy, featuring of course those twin guitars, this is a good tune i'm surprised the TV people haven't discovered it yet - a very "peaceful" way to close a very enjoyable album, which will be a top favourite of mine for some time to come! overall very highly recommended, some very memorable songs, the band are really on form here, an excellent addition to any prog music collection, easily 4 stars.