Friday, January 25, 2008

VAN STEPHENSON - China Girl (1981)

VAN STEPHENSON - China Girl (1981) front
The rare and hard to find Van Stephenson.
His first album in the small label Handshake Records, sadly never issued on CD.
At this time (early '80s) Van was writing hit songs for artists from the Nashville scene (e.g. Restless Heart) and the songwriting in 'China Girl' follow these roots.
Mid-westcoast sound, with some late 70's AOR feel.
Think Eagles meets Pages, classic.
His voice is brilliant here, as always (listen 'New York, Hold Her Tight', awesome).
Very good and polished production.
Vinyl-rip nicely done.

1. You′ve Got A Good Love Coming
2. Looks Like A Loser
3. Seeing Is Believing
4. China Girl
5. Weekend Warrior
6. I Would If I Could
7. Tonight The Love's On Me
8. Hotter In The Night
9. New York, Hold Her Tight
10. Lion In The Night

Van Stephenson: Vocals, Guitars
Wayne Perkins, Kenny Mims: Guitars
Larry Baxton: Bass
Mike Hanna: Keyboards
Shane Keister: Synthesizers
Joe English: Drums


RE-POSTED HERE
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Friday, January 04, 2008

AOR TREASURES - The Light Years 89 - 93


Now covering the 'Light Years' 89-93, those years were glorious, making the AOR / Melodic Hard Rock genre mainstream.
Easily I can do 10 best of only with the excellent albums publicated in 1989, but again, in this compilation, the chosen bands didn't make it, even in that brillant era. After '93 the dark ages arrived...
A few bands here were reissued, but mostly remain out of print.
Maybe you can say: 'hey, some tracks here are hard rock' or something like that, to me, all are keyboard and guitar driven AOR.
60min. of music, 320K vbr, artwork.
A nice collection IMHO.

01 - Mystery: Keep On Rollin'
02 - Nova Rex: Alone Tonight
03 - Alien: Tears Don't Put Out The Fire ('89 version)
04 - Surrender: Never
05 - Chase: You Will Be The One
06 - Sharks & Whales: Dreamer's Lane
07 - DC Drive: Don't Let Get You Down (Radio Version)
08 - Fighter: Nice Guy
09 - Worrall: Shadow Of A Lie
10 - Bite The Bullet: Change Of Heart
11 - Bryan Hughes Group: Who's Gonna Love You Tonight
12 - Stranger (Germany): Fighting For Your Love
13 - Eye (USA): It Might Rain
14 - Hiroshima: Broken Heart
15 - Evenrude: Never Say Die


AOR TREASURES - The Light Years 89 - 93
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