Tuesday, July 19, 2016

20/20 BLIND - Never Far (1994)

20/20 BLIND - Never Far (1994)
Requested by one of you...

20/20 BLIND were an underground band based in Houston, TX, and I said underground mostly because they were playing American Hard Rock in the second half of the '90s, an era when the genre and 'hooks' were almost a bad word.
The band had a CCM background, hence it's not strange that Benson Music Group accepted to distribute their debut album "Never Far" released in 1994.

20/20 BLIND style is US Hard Rock with the trademark sound from bands of this ilk circa 1991/92, especially the guitars, where still retaining the melody and catchiness from the '80s, added more thickness to the riffs.
There's steady tracks here like 'Show Each Other Love', 'Washed', the melodic 'Do I', the acoustically filled title track 'Never Far' and the heavier closer 'Sleepyland'. 
They do as well a nice semi-ballad on 'Love Keeps Me Reaching', more melodic hard rock oriented.

20/20 BLIND - Never Far (1994) back

"Never Far" is a nice and quite unknown record, nothing ground-breaking but pretty solid and especially very well produced for the genre / era with Brian Garcia (Galactic Cowboys) behind the desk. Throw me a pile of stones but I found 20/20 BLIND sound similar to Blue Murder / John Sykes solo around the same year, and some Extreme also.

01 - Wash
02 - Soul Song
03 - Love Keeps Reaching
04 - I Am Blind
05 - Do I
06 - Easier Way
07 - Never Far
08 - Show Each Other Love
09 - Only Hope
10 - Sleepyland

Wallace Chase: Lead Vocals
Doug Middleton: Guitars, Backing Vocals
Mike McNeely: Guitars, Backing Vocals
Schon Alkire: Bass, Backing Vocals
Chris Laurents: Drums, Backing Vocals
Phil Beck: Keyboards, Backing Vocals
Charles Powell: Backing Vocals




20/20 BLIND - Never Far
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1 Comments:

jerry_beck said...

Love Keeps Me Waiting is an awesome power ballad. The rest however is meh, very mediocre/boring.