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If Lennon and McCartney hadn't split up in 1971 and instead decided, to cut to the chase and ride the wave of those times, to send away the great Ringo and George and hire two devastating rockers like, I don't know… Carmine Appice on drums and Jim McCarty on guitar, while simultaneously screaming into the microphones (which they knew how to do… like in "Helter Skelter" or "Twist and Shout"), well, the music of Cheap Trick would have emerged.
That wasn't the case, as the actual Cheap Trick emerged from Illinois in the late seventies, while Lennon was making music sporadically and McCartney was putting out perhaps too much. Thus, Cheap Trick are like Beatles who scream to sing and thrash to play… The effect has always been pleasant and thrilling, irresistible in the years of great compositional inspiration, at least sufficient in periods of low creativity.
Nevertheless, they are still alive and kicking after half a century, moving forward and releasing new music at a good pace, which does them credit. This album from 2016 travels well… nothing groundbreaking but nothing wrong either. It has a powerful start with the driving "Heart on the Line"… Zander is a supreme vocalist of hard rock, the hyper-produced "No Direction Home", the lyrical "When I Wake Up Tomorrow", which confirms the young Nielsen as an excellent replacement for the old drummer/tabacconist, who returned to the shop.
The guitarist's son pounds away like Bonham in "Do You Believe Me?", deliciously raw and chaotic. "Blood Red Lips" is the usual rock'n'roll of Cheap Trick but… it showcases the father Nielsen's big guitars! They resonate well even in the hard+Beatles ballad "Sing My Blues Away", a true hallmark thanks to the terribly Lennon-like voice, but with a strong edge from the blond frontman Robin.
"Roll Me" offers the typical chromatic descents of Petersson's multi-string bass, who despite his surname is not blond, but brunette. "The in Crowd" is negligible, not so "Long Time No See Ya" which starts with a deceptive sequence of synths, immediately devoured by a Zeppelin-like funky hard in which Zander once again shows that at sixty, he has the same voice as at twenty, unlike the great Plant.
The melodic and badass bass of the Swedish brunette is again prominent in "The Sun Never Sets", loudly shouted, thick, tough, played on dramatic and suspended minor tones, great choruses, powerful rolls. At the end of the nearly dozen tracks, the vaguely new wave "All Strung Out" diversifies it all, with its almost spoken singing.
It's only rock'n'roll, as always for them. It's great to hear them still on top form, bombastic, simple yet smart, old but vigorous. They no longer have the melodic genius strokes of youth but the desire, energy, and plausibility are all still there.
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