Loud Lion
Die Tough
Melodic Rock Records
2014
Many times it happens to all of us to listen to our favorite music and think that a chorus or a bridge or a guitar solo or the timbre of a singer’s voice resembles something that we have heard in the past and has been assimilated well into our minds. I think that this fact is perfectly normal as some bands came first at the very beginning of the rock genre and some others followed and still are following those luminary “leaders”. It’s a very heavy burden for a band to be a pioneer in a genre, partly because it puts the sound foundation of a musical wave and secondly, the fans always expect you to exceed the benchmark that you set by yourself each time, by presenting something new and exciting that will blow them away. Anyway, the history of music has always had to show phenomena of mimicry, from bands that reproduce the sound of any of the bands that influenced them strongly and led them to get involved with music, regardless of whether it was solely for speculative purposes and awareness or just tribute. And don’t tell me that there are few bands that instead of styling their hair in front of mirrors, did it in front of the posters of Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, Metallica, Manowar, AC/DC, Saxon, Black Sabbath, Helloween, Queensryche, Bon Jovi, Motley Crue, Kiss, Ratt, Van Halen, Whitesnake, Dokken, etc., who pioneered the genre they represent. It is, just like that, when you establish a musical faculty and it is absolutely reasonable for many followers/copycats to exist.
Between the bands I mentioned above, I deliberately did not mention a name that rocked the boat of hard rock from the early 80s and has managed, so far to sell millions of records around the world. Of course I’m talking about the British band, Def Leppard who became over the years a milestone band for the hard rock sound, reaching their zenith with the monumental classic and diamond awarded album “Hysteria” which was released in 1987 and soared straight to no1 on the charts around the world. Could it be ever possible for a band of this caliber, to not affect musicians around the world? Certainly not. Jogging my memory back to the day, I remember the Australians BB Steal who released the album “On the Edge” in 1991, that sounded accurately like a bang up, right in the footsteps of Leppard with the production of the album handled by Phil Collen himself, as well as in the recent past the Swedish band Grand Design who musically followed the same path. Another one group, with which we will deal this time and has chosen the musical direction of Def Leppard with incredible similarities, are Loud Lion, who after a long time in the making, release their debut album titled “Die Tough”. If someone put me down to listen to their songs and asked me to name the band, I would say confidently that Def Leppard is behind all this with unreleased songs of “Hysteria”… but I would be wrong. (editor’s note : Wait until you google Summers – “Let’s Make Love” as Def Leppard – “Let’s Make Love” and start wondering why you’re not getting any results :D as I did)
I didn’t know anything about Loud Lion and googling about them revealed that they are a side-project consisting of Bleu Mcauley along with Taylor Locke (Bleu’s co-creator & main partner in Loud Lion, most widely known as the lead guitarist for Rooney), Robbie Royce (vocals), Adam Ross (Rihanna’s touring guitarist), Allison Robertson (The Donnas female lead guitarist), Maclaine Diemer (Bang Camaro – keyboards, guitar), John Fields (Uber producer) and Dylan Halacy (Bang Camaro – drums).
“Die Tough” consists of nine compositions of which the seven are normal tracks and two of them are instrumental tracks with neoclassical guitar elements (Cacophony meets Michael Angelo Batio style). I listened to the album a few too many times and I won’t lie, I’m listening to it just right now as I’m putting down my thoughts about the album in this article... well I can’t get enough of it. According to Bleu, he and his friends have done a tribute band to Def Leppard, to pay homage to them and their producer Mutt Lange and they are doing the job, just exquisitely. Everything is cut and sewn to resemble “Hysteria” and the songs sound amazing in structure with that album being the point of reference; vocals are just like Joe Elliott’s and the guitars are sounding like those of Clark & Collen. I wouldn’t like to analyze each particular song because I can’t find a specific reason to do this. Those who will enter in the process to obtain and listen, to “Die Tough” will know what I mean. I think that Loud Lion’s musical approach would be too risky because this album will be discussed intensely from the day of its release and possibly will split the hard rock fans into two camps; to those who will be delighted and those that will ruthlessly criticize the band as Leppard’s copyists and a total clone, especially the fanatic ones. In other words, “Die Tough” is the definition of a “love it or hate it” release. This time I preferred not to rate this release, to let you do this instead of me and I’m looking forward to see the results and discuss them with you.
Between the bands I mentioned above, I deliberately did not mention a name that rocked the boat of hard rock from the early 80s and has managed, so far to sell millions of records around the world. Of course I’m talking about the British band, Def Leppard who became over the years a milestone band for the hard rock sound, reaching their zenith with the monumental classic and diamond awarded album “Hysteria” which was released in 1987 and soared straight to no1 on the charts around the world. Could it be ever possible for a band of this caliber, to not affect musicians around the world? Certainly not. Jogging my memory back to the day, I remember the Australians BB Steal who released the album “On the Edge” in 1991, that sounded accurately like a bang up, right in the footsteps of Leppard with the production of the album handled by Phil Collen himself, as well as in the recent past the Swedish band Grand Design who musically followed the same path. Another one group, with which we will deal this time and has chosen the musical direction of Def Leppard with incredible similarities, are Loud Lion, who after a long time in the making, release their debut album titled “Die Tough”. If someone put me down to listen to their songs and asked me to name the band, I would say confidently that Def Leppard is behind all this with unreleased songs of “Hysteria”… but I would be wrong. (editor’s note : Wait until you google Summers – “Let’s Make Love” as Def Leppard – “Let’s Make Love” and start wondering why you’re not getting any results :D as I did)
I didn’t know anything about Loud Lion and googling about them revealed that they are a side-project consisting of Bleu Mcauley along with Taylor Locke (Bleu’s co-creator & main partner in Loud Lion, most widely known as the lead guitarist for Rooney), Robbie Royce (vocals), Adam Ross (Rihanna’s touring guitarist), Allison Robertson (The Donnas female lead guitarist), Maclaine Diemer (Bang Camaro – keyboards, guitar), John Fields (Uber producer) and Dylan Halacy (Bang Camaro – drums).
“Die Tough” consists of nine compositions of which the seven are normal tracks and two of them are instrumental tracks with neoclassical guitar elements (Cacophony meets Michael Angelo Batio style). I listened to the album a few too many times and I won’t lie, I’m listening to it just right now as I’m putting down my thoughts about the album in this article... well I can’t get enough of it. According to Bleu, he and his friends have done a tribute band to Def Leppard, to pay homage to them and their producer Mutt Lange and they are doing the job, just exquisitely. Everything is cut and sewn to resemble “Hysteria” and the songs sound amazing in structure with that album being the point of reference; vocals are just like Joe Elliott’s and the guitars are sounding like those of Clark & Collen. I wouldn’t like to analyze each particular song because I can’t find a specific reason to do this. Those who will enter in the process to obtain and listen, to “Die Tough” will know what I mean. I think that Loud Lion’s musical approach would be too risky because this album will be discussed intensely from the day of its release and possibly will split the hard rock fans into two camps; to those who will be delighted and those that will ruthlessly criticize the band as Leppard’s copyists and a total clone, especially the fanatic ones. In other words, “Die Tough” is the definition of a “love it or hate it” release. This time I preferred not to rate this release, to let you do this instead of me and I’m looking forward to see the results and discuss them with you.