BRAND NEW MORNING

After the whole hit and miss ordeal with the first two Magnum albums I decided that there wasn't any reason for me to pursue the bands other releases. Of course that didn't stop me from listening to Brand New Morning but the reason for that was entirely different.

One of my friends at KTH (Royal Institute of Technology) is a huge fan of '70s rock bands like Black Sabbath, Uriah Heep, Saxon etc. So one day after a brief discussion it turned out that he also was a huge Magnum fan. Although we seemed to have entirely different tastes when it came to the band's career he still recommended me to check out some of their later works and ultimately agreed to lend me his copy of Brand New Morning.

Well the album does indeed show a totally new side of Magnum for me starting with the heavy title track Brand New Morning which was actually not bad at all! I was really surprised by how great Bob Catley's vocals still sound although he's been in the business for more than 30 years. Tony Clarkin has acquired a totally different style where his guitar basically creates a wall of sound the Bob's vocals bounce off while the rest of the instruments are there to keep the groove going.

Still many of these songs are very forgettable and listening to this album today on Spotify brings almost no memories to me. It doesn't really help that many of these songs make me think of other popular bands like Whitesnake or even Sonata Arctica!

No, Brand New Morning is by no means a return to form, at least not the one I experienced on their 1978 debut album.

**** star songs: Brand New Morning (6:17) We All Run (4:54) The Scarecrow (9:50)

*** star songs: It's Time To Come Together (4:36) The Blue And The Grey (5:53) I'd Breathe For You (6:27) The Last Goodbye (6:28) Immigrant Son (5:35) Hard Road (5:21)