Senmayan

Hi surferkangaroo, I read the news about Norway in the weekly Friday of Repubblica; of course, I trust your words more ;)

Italy even came in second place after France for the best healthcare system, which means that in other countries, things are really bad. It must be said that in Italy, however, there's no risk as in America of not being treated if you're in serious condition or have cancer. There, the welfare state is almost an unknown term. However, Moore does not mention Italy, perhaps because he finds the second place somewhat paradoxical. He also said he wanted to mention Norway, because patients there are even sent on trips to the Balearic Islands, but if he had shown all of this, people would have laughed in his face for being "too good to be true." A somewhat lengthy review.

After Sanjuro's comment, which will surely go down in Debaser history, let's make a more down-to-earth comment regarding the review. I partially agree with Festwca about Dickinson, not in considering him a copy of Halford; in fact, he was one of the first to adopt that singing style in a metal context—he was a leader, not a follower. However, he did kick off a whole wave of castrated metal singers, which in many cases annoys me. Dickinson is acceptable; he has a nice voice (technically better than Di'Anno's), but I prefer Di'Anno's feeling.

It must have been a great concert! A piece of advice for Bubi: start with the early albums, the freshest and most original ones. Even I, listening to some tracks on TV or just by chance, didn't really take to them at first and found their sound annoying beyond measure. I realized that I had listened to some of their tracks from the '90s and beyond. Then I bought "Killers" and I really re-evaluated them. I prefer the period with Di'Anno; "The Number of the Beast" doesn't particularly excite me, but I find "Seventh Son of a Seventh Son" beautiful and "Powerslave" enjoyable.

It must have been a great concert! A piece of advice for Bubi: start with the early albums, the freshest and most original ones. Even I, listening to some tracks on TV or just by chance, didn't really take to them at first and found their sound annoying beyond measure. I realized that I had listened to some of their tracks from the '90s and beyond. Then I bought "Killers" and I really re-evaluated them. I prefer the period with Di'Anno; "The Number of the Beast" doesn't particularly excite me, but I find "Seventh Son of a Seventh Son" beautiful and "Powerslave" enjoyable.

The cover of this band is quite ridiculous anyway; instead of the seal man, they could have come up with something better. For some, their poor success has also depended on their image, and in a world like ours, often image matters more than music. However, if I'm not mistaken, Capitol (the label that released the album) tried in every way to prevent the album from being published. Angry fans destroyed and slashed the tires of the Capitol executives' cars, and after various pressures, including from critics, the album was finally released. Then the Riot were dropped by this major and fell into the underground metal scene. Unlucky band, in short.

I find the review charming and it piques the curiosity even of an audience that's hostile and allergic to classical music— and isn’t that what matters? Well done, Nero, even though you've done better.

The Europeans don’t interest me, to be honest; I don’t know them and I’m not really keen on exploring them. Yes, I wrote the review of Ten ;-), in the end, Ten are the exception that proves the rule, in the sense that they are Europeans who play AOR with a European sound, even if their subsequent albums drifted away from AOR. Already "The Name of the Rose" has a tougher sound. Actually, just to give you an idea, I recommend you download the song "The Name of the Rose" by Ten, which might be the best song of theirs and probably among the best melodic hard rock songs of the 90s. If you don’t like that one, you can be sure you’ll also hate the various offshoots that aren’t strictly AOR but almost ;-)

Anyway, I have considerably downsized my opinion on Asia as well; two years ago, I would have given a higher rating to the album, but now I find them nice, cute, and personal.

Hi Adriano, for me, catchy songs don’t mean crap (from what you wrote, it seems you agree), what can be annoying about AOR (and why many people hate it) is that it has a melodic spirit typical of the 80s, now outdated, so you either like it or you don’t, but it’s not trivial, also because unlike current pop songs, AOR is played and arranged by musicians, in short, it’s not just sampled sounds, rather often AOR is played by album producers (those who know the tricks of the trade) or famous session musicians. Pure AOR indeed doesn’t excite me much either; in fact, AOR makes catchiness its weapon, and if it doesn’t hit, it is an utter disaster, it comes across as sappy and cheesy, but that’s just one side of the coin, because in general, those who play AOR are always skilled songwriters and instrumentalists in search of the "perfect chorus." Try listening to Giant and House of Lords, elegant bands with AOR elements, but above all hard rock, they are massive, there’s a good dose of melody but it’s never cloying. Sure, I don’t want to convince you; I understand your gut dislike for the genre, especially since I only like AOR when it’s mixed with other genres, because the pure stuff (except for Journey) feels too sugary for me. However, AOR embodies an era (in its most trivial aspects) that is decadent and hedonistic, and especially a country like America; that’s why in Europe, apart from sporadic cases, it’s never really taken root, Europe has always been viewed as somber and sad, AOR has nothing to do with our continent, in fact, European AOR bands are mostly ridiculous.