Homerun
Don't Stop

These days it takes quite a bit of courage to produce an album like this "Don't Stop." Indeed, you can say anything about Homerun, except that they follow trends, as their debut is a real hard rock knockout (with some nods to heavy, which never hurts).

Round and full sounds, guitars fiercely in the foreground, a great voice that scratches and makes each track vibrate. You quickly listen to the album and say "it's so true that no one knows how to rock like they do on the west coast", but then you look at the CD credits and see that the band is entirely Italian. What amazes is the sound of Homerun, a true wall that immediately hits you in the gut. It's worth remembering that the album was completely self-produced by a band that immediately shows great maturity.

The musical references of the Varese sextet (vocals, bass, drums, two guitars, and keyboards) can certainly be found in bands like Van Halen and Bon Jovi, at least as far as songwriting is concerned. I like to imagine a dash of Kiss as well, but I wouldn’t want to overdo it. If we speak of guitars (a subject always dear to me), then we have to bring up people like the little Italian virtuoso, especially from the period following David Coverdale first and then Dave Lee Roth. All this is not to say that we are faced with a band that copies from everywhere, but to emphasize the musical pantheon of reference for Homerun. Maybe it's just me, but I really like the rhythms of this album: nice and full, powerful, always punctual and never excessive, and above all, always with the right colors for each track. Credit also goes to the bass, which carves out a significant role in almost every track without ever overdoing it.

My favorite tracks? Definitely the opener, Full Throttle, which immediately shows you how the music goes. And then, in no particular order, Baby, Rolling, Don't Stop, and I Wanna Rock. The only perplexity is with Nothin' Else, the ballad that closes the album: I don’t know what it is, but something doesn’t convince me. An album that should be listened to in its entirety and can't certainly be considered just a collection of individual tracks, as happens more and more often nowadays.

Ultimately, a really excellent album (from April 24th you can find it on the Self distribution website): to stay in debaserian terms, I’d say we are facing a "almost 4" (hence my 3). Now I'm curious to see the band live since the guys have proven to excel in the studio. Sure, it's very likely that an album like this will be listened to more abroad than here, but aren’t we living in a global village period? Rock & Roll!