Well, it's that time of year again - Christmas. And it's been a good year for me music-wise, so let's take a look at all the new albums I picked up, gigs, blog updates etc. for 2024! By far the biggest and most important thing to happen to me this year is undoubtedly my engagement to my fiancée. So coincidentally this has been one of the most important years of my life!
NEW RELEASES (worst to best):
Absolutely nothing I've bought that's been released this year has been flat-out poor, but my least favourite is probably Blue Oyster Cult's Ghost Stories. The weird thing about this one is that it's actually made up of old and unreleased tracks recorded between 1978 and 2016. The bulk of the songs are old-school, but the production has been tarted up in the studio to enhance the sound. So the album definitely sounds good, it's a shame then that the songs themselves are a mixed bag. There's a couple of covers here (The Animals' 'We Gotta Get Out of This Place' and MC5's 'Kick Out the Jams') I don't care much for, and many of the original tracks feel like they never previously released for a reason. Some are rather good (I love 'Soul Jive'), and none are totally offensive to my ears or anything like that, it's just not a particularly memorable album and the mish-mash of songs from different eras makes the record feel disjointed and directionless. It's a shame, because 2020's comeback The Symbol Remains was outstandingly strong and my favourite album from that year. With Ghost Stories however, I've only listened to it a handful of times and rarely feel the urge to revisit it.
Next, Nails' Every Bridge Burning. It's a very good album - and if you enjoyed anything else this band has put out, I don't really see how you couldn't not like this one too. Nails are possibly one of the laziest bands in history when it comes to actually releasing music; they have 4 albums in total, the first being Unsilent Death from 2010. Sounds fine, until you realise that all 4 of these records totals to just 69 minutes of music in total!! So no, the band don't stray away from their usual habits; Every Bridge Burning is just 17 minutes long too. The good news is that, like all their other albums, this one certainly stacks up to the rest. Yeah their albums are short, but they're all good. And to be honest, does anyone really need to sit through an hour of face-ripping, grinding powerviolence such as this?! Yep, this album is every bit as raging as the rest of their catalogue. You do get the occasional groove-based riff and slow-tempo here and there, but it only adds to the enjoyment of the music. I haven't listened to this one much, but it sounds exactly like Nails to me - so it's good!
My next pick would have to be Bruce Dickinson's latest solo effort, The Mandrake Project. This album has some very high points, with a few tracks such as the crushing 'Afterglow of Ragnarok', and others like 'Many Doors to Hell', 'Rain on the Graves' and 'Mistress of Mercy' that rival some of the best songs Iron Maiden have recorded in the past 20 years. The inclusion of 'Eternity Has Failed', the original rendition of Maiden's 'If Eternity Should Fail' is a bit of an odd one, but still very enjoyable. I find the album loses steam a little towards the end with songs like 'Shadow of the Gods' and 'Sonata (Immortal Beloved)', but for the most part I think The Mandrake Project is an impressive effort from a legendary singer. Weirdly I'd never picked up any of Bruce's solo album before this one, so I may have to change that.
And the next choice for me is Saxon with Hell, Fire and Damnation. By default I knew this would be a good 'un. I mean, since 1997's Unleash the Beast Saxon have been one of, if not the most consistently strong heavy metal bands in the biz. Hell, Fire and Damnation is yet another awesome album in their massive catalogue; it doesn't do anything new or innovative, but Saxon have a very specific formula to their metal. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. Standout cuts for me are the title track, 'Madam Guillotine' and '1066', but the entire album is rock-solid from start to finish. Like everything they've released in the past 25+ years, the record is jam-packed full of meat n' potatoes old-school riffage (no breakdowns, no djent bullshit, just pure metal), historical lyrical matter, Andy Sneap's production is fire and Biff Byford is still killin' it as a singer now in his '70s!! I'm still not sure if I like this one more than 2022's Carpe Diem, but it's certainly one more album in what it is a killer discography. It's also the first album to feature Diamond Head guitarist and legend Brian Tatler, following Paul Quinn's retirement. They couldn't have found a better replacement.
At number 3 is Magnum's Here Comes the Rain. The brains of Magnum, Tony Clarkin tragically and unexpectedly passed away in January just days before this album dropped, so I can only assume this will be their swansong. But what a swansong it is - hell, what a discography they have. Here Comes the Rain doesn't do anything differently to what they've done since their reformation in the early 2000s (except maybe the horns on the fantastic 'The Seventh Darkness'), no, but it then it doesn't need to either. 'Run Into the Shadows' is just majestic, 'Blue Tango' is a fun rocker, 'The Day He Lied' is an excellent ballad while 'After the Silence' is uplifting. I stand by the fact Magnum have never released a poor album. And this one is superb, yet again.
What I thought would be my top choice for the year has actually ended up in second place, and that's Judas Priest's Invincible Shield. They had a tough task in following up with something as worthy as 2018's Firepower - that was an incredibly strong record. But guess what, they did manage to better it with Invincible Shield! At least in my opinion anyway. Songs like 'Panic Attack', 'The Serpent and the King', 'As God Is My Witness' and the epic title track are absolutely blazing, molten metal 'bangers that rival the intensity of their 1990 masterpiece that is Painkiller! Rob Halford's vocals are still unbelievably impressive, especially now that he's in his early '70s. You'd never guess it. There's a small number of lesser tracks here, sure, but the entire album is still ridiculously enjoyable from start to finish. It perfectly continues the bands legacy as the metal pioneers they are.
And taking the top spot is Deep Purple's =1. I wouldn't necessarily say I was sceptical about new guitarist Simon McBride; I saw the band live in 2022 with him and was very impressed with what he was doing on stage with Purple. But I really had no clue how a new studio album with him would stack up next to all the excellent records they'd made with Steve Morse prior. Reality is that they've somehow managed to record one of the greatest albums of the second-half of their career. The Morse albums had their own distinctive sound, especially when Bob Ezrin began producing them in 2013, starting with the superb Now What?!. With McBride stepping in, =1 is the most rockin', fun Purple album in years! Bob Ezrin is still producing thankfully, but the sound on this record is a bit more in tune with the Purple of old. Songs like 'Lazy Sod', 'Portable Door', 'Now You're Talkin'', 'Sharp Shooter' and 'Show Me' are full of heavy grooves and Ian Gillan displays more energy on this album with his vocals than he has done in years. And this is coming from a fan that loves the majority of the Steve Morse stuff! Other tracks like 'A Bit On the Side', 'Old-Fangled Thing' and 'Bleeding Obvious' are all destined to become classics in due time, surely?! Judas Priest were winning until this dropped in July. Seriously, if you're one of those Ritchie Blackmore purists and refuse to listen to anything that came after his departure in the '90s, you're missing out. I'm still regularly spinning =1, I cannot get enough of it. If this ends up being their final album, then kudos to them.
CONCERTS:
So the first gig I attended this year was Filter back in March at the 02 Academy in Birmingham. My mate asked if I wanted to join him, otherwise I wouldn't have gone. Considering the only song I'd ever heard by Filter prior was 'Take a Picture', I had a good night - so I'm glad I did go. I'd known of them and that song since my teens, and I think I had intended to pick up one of their albums after this gig, but for whatever reason I still haven't! Still, the show took place on one of the smaller upstairs stages at the 02, which actually made it better in my opinion. It was pretty packed, but it made the atmosphere all the more fun. The band played in really dark lighting and delivered their brand of grungy, industrial rock to the crowd. Richard Patrick said he had a cold from what I remember, but he seemed super happy to be there and it didn't affect his vocals. Support was a UK band I'd never heard of, Belmondo. They sounded a little '90s alternative rock/grunge to me, but they were pretty decent all things considered.
Next gig I saw was Judas Priest just a few days later at the NEC in Birmingham. They were promoting the awesome new record, Invincible Shield, and in support of them were 2 more of my favourite bands - Saxon and Uriah Heep. So, quite a lineup then. Uriah Heep's set was brief but fun, with a nice mixture of oldies and new tracks from 2023's excellent Chaos & Colour. Saxon were even better, playing for an hour. Again, plenty of oldies (Biff even asked the audience if we'd prefer them to play 'Crusader' or 'Dallas 1PM'... 'Dallas 1PM' got the vote) as well stuff from the latest album, Hell, Fire & Damnation. Pyro usage on stage too, which was cool. Maybe not the absolute best performance I've seen from them (I've seen them live a few times), but an awesome way to set the scene. Meanwhile Judas Priest killed it. The new songs from Invincible Shield are sure to be classics in a few years time. My only real complaint would be the fairly predictable setlist beyond the new songs. The only real surprise was 'Sword of Damocles' from Redeemer of Souls and possibly 'Rapid Fire' from British Steel. Not that there's anything wrong with hearing 'You've Got Another Thing Comin'', 'Painkiller', 'Breaking the Law' etc., it's just that I've seen Priest a number of times and found they would often throw in several deep cuts into their setlists (unlike Iron Maiden). I've seen them play absolute 'bangers before like 'Freewheel Burning', 'Dissident Aggressor', 'Exciter', 'A Touch of Evil', 'Invader', 'Hell Patrol', 'Rocka Rocka' etc. before. Still, the performance itself was as good as any other time I've seen them and the setlist thing is more of a personal issue. Rob Halford still sounded brilliant and Ritchie Faulkner has cemented himself into the legacy of the band.
In June I saw Smashing Pumpkins and Weezer at the Utilita Arena, again in Birmingham. I wasn't overly impressed with Weezer; they're a band with songs I dig, but I wouldn't call myself a fan by any stretch of the imagination. Even so, their performance was pretty unremarkable and Rivers Cuomo didn't seem terribly excited to be there in all honesty. They were just 'okay' then. Smashing Pumpkins were better; Billy Corgan fronted a lengthy 2 hour set and the setlist they performed was great. The Atum triple album had a long list of ups and downs, but they only really played the better songs from the album. Most of the usual classics from the '90s such as 'Tonight, Tonight', '1979', 'Ava Adore', 'Today' etc. were as enjoyable as ever. This performance didn't top the first time I saw them in 2018 at Wembley Arena for me, but I left the concert feeling satisfied with what I'd seen, and this is all that matters.
Then in July I went to the Foo Fighters gig at Villa Park stadium (in Birmingham yet again). This was the first time I'd ever seen them, plus the first time I've ever attended a concert at Villa Park. I'm only a very casual Foo Fighters listener, but was hugely impressed with the 3 hour set they played. I think Dave Grohl is an excellent frontman and knows exactly how to work and entertain the crowd, and while I find a handful of their songs to be overplayed in general, in live perspective they work incredibly well. Tons of energy, tons of fun! Support wasn't great however. Hot Milk was wayyy too emo for me. Meanwhile, Courtney Barnett's brand of garage rock sounded pretty good to me, but her monotone vocals got on my nerves after a couple of songs. 2 strange and unfitting opening support acts for what was an excellent headlining set otherwise.
The best concert for me this year had to be Bruce Springsteen at Wembley Stadium in London. There was no support, but the Boss always plays a 3 hour set anyway, and the time flew by! The concert was so good that it might possibly the be the best gig I've ever seen! In terms of pure showmanship and crowd interaction etc., Bruce and the whole E Street gang were just sublime from start to finish. There's songs and eras of his that I like more than others, naturally, but I had a huge smile on my face for the entire duration of the show. It really was special. Plus, Pierce Brosnan walked past me during the set!
In August I attended Bloodstock Open Air for my summer heavy metal fix, like I always do. It was a pretty good year as usual. The weather turned out to be decent and mostly dry, and there was lots of drinking and fun banter. Although none of my favourite bands were present this year, there were still plenty of acts there that I own albums from and do still enjoy. Favourite performances this year for me were Forbidden, Rotting Christ, Clutch, Green Lung, Deicide and Enslaved.
Last month I saw my absolute favourite band of all time, Deep Purple for the second time at the NEC. It was a treat to be able to see them and one of my other all-time favourites, Judas Priest in the same year! I think Purple's performance was on par with when I saw them in 2022. But it was nice to have plenty of new songs from =1 in the setlist, because like I said earlier in the post, that's my 2024 album of the year. Hell, I'd have been happy for them to have played =1 in full! Don Airey's keyboard wizardry was the highlight of the show for me, with Simon McBride's virtuoso guitar playing coming in close second. And given how old Ian Gillan is now, I thought he still delivered a rock-solid vocal performance. I'm pretty sure he said they'll only retire when the quality of their concerts begins to slip, and that sure isn't the case yet. Support was Reef; bit of an odd choice and certainly not as cool as having Blue Oyster Cult like we did in 2022, but still a band I've always somewhat liked. They were entertaining enough either way.
Just a few days ago I attended my last concert this year - Cats in Space at KK's Steel Mill in Wolverhampton. They're a new-ish band formed in 2015, but made up of veteran musicians. I got into them thanks to YouTube channel Sea of Tranquility. They're a band that gets a lot of exposure on that channel, and are often highly praised in that neck of the woods for good reason. I bought the band's 2022 album, Kickstart the Sun this year and really dug it, so when I saw they were playing the relatively-local Steel Mill in December I decided to get a ticket. They didn't disappoint. Their music is a fine blend of hard rock and power pop, with a distinctly '70s classic rock feel. They kind of sound like a blend of early Queen, ELO and Boston - hooks to die for, big riffs, great use of keyboards and amazing melodies. If they'd existed in the '70s, they'd have been massive. They're certainly a band that deserves to be playing to bigger crowds, but because concert tickets are so damn pricey nowadays, I'm kind of glad I only had to pay 20 quid to see them! Support was keyboard-driven comedy rock act Willie Dowling. He kind of reminded me of Warren Zevon - wasn't terribly impressed but he was entertaining while he lasted.
THE BLOG AND MY COLLECTION:
It's been a productive year in terms of this blog and expanding my collection. I managed to get hold of all the major releases from UFO, Magnum and Venom - 3 discographies I've wanted to review in full and own the complete physical catalogue for many years. There's live albums I'm missing from all these of course, but I like to own all the studio albums at the minimum. Anyhow, there's been unfinished pages here on all these bands for many years, so it's nice to finally have all these albums reviewed in detail. Plus, from a collectors' point of view, having a complete discography on my shelves always looks awesome.
I think of these 3 bands, Magnum have the most consistent catalogue. Simply put, it's a huge discography and there's no such thing as a bad Magnum album. They're all 7/10s and higher for me personally. They're also one of those rare legacy bands for me that I think put out a lot of their best material towards the end of their recording career. I find myself listening to albums like Here Comes the Rain, The Serpent Rings, Escape from the Shadow Garden and Lost On the Road to Eternity more often than I do anything they put out in the '80s. Sadly, with Tony Clarkin's passing back in January, I doubt we'll get any more studio albums from them (Tony being the songwriter), but Bob Catley is still touring as Magnum right now.
I think UFO have more 'seminal'/influential albums overall, even if Magnum have more great ones for me overall. I mean, Strangers in the Night is by far one of the greatest live albums of all time, and Obsession is pretty untouchable. It feels great to have all their major albums in my collection now.
Meanwhile Venom pretty much invented extreme metal as we know it. But they're one of those bands whereby a lot of people love the first 3 and seem to forget about the rest. Truth is their discography is full of forgotten gems such as Prime Evil, Temples of Ice and Resurrection. Plus, there's some strong latter-career albums like From the Very Depths and Fallen Angels that I'd missed out on 'til this year. I'll also give Venom Inc. huge credit because I've seen them live 3 times and both albums they've made are rock-solid. I had to pay more than I would've liked for Temples of Ice and The Waste Lands - these are hard to find and pretty pricey everywhere it seems, but it's cool to have them at last.
I also just recently finished re-writing my Iron Maiden page. This was something I'd been meaning to do for a long time - I first put this page up way back in 2017 when I first started this blog, but those original reviews are long gone. I deleted them all when I did my first re-write of the page in 2020 because I hate reading anything here pre-COVID. It was all crap. And in all fairness, most of my 2020 update was shite too, not in terms of the writing itself, but in terms of my own opinions and arguments. I mean, I can't believe I only gave Seventh Son of a Seventh Son an 8/10!! Not than an 8/10 is bad, but SSoaSS is a legit classic and easily worthy a 9. I've always loved that record since my teens, but for whatever reason I was in some sort of cynical, argumentative mindset when I did that 2020 re-write.
I was also hoping that my opinion of 21st century Maiden would be less critical in 2024. I slagged off a lot of their newer albums in 2020. To be honest, I've never been a true 'fan' of Iron Maiden from 2000 onward - and I still think albums like A Matter of Life and Death and The Final Frontier are full of problems now. But after listening to Dance of Death and in particular, the superb Book of Souls from 2015, I can at least confirm that some of these latter Maiden records have gone up in my books considerably. Anyhow, it was fun revisiting the entire catalogue. I kept all the 2020 reviews up as a comparison, save for the live album reviews because they were just awful. I did re-review the live albums however, and can honestly say I had a blast with all those too.
I didn't count the Black Sabbath boxset Anno Domini 1989-1995 in my new releases list because it's comprised solely of the old Tony Martin era Sabbath material that's been out of print for so long. But in reality this is my number 1 release out of everything this year. But like I said, this is just a box of old albums, albums I've loved for years and years now. Sabbath fans have been teased this boxset for a very long time, so it's nice to finally have it in my hands!! Headless Cross is my absolute favourite album in the set, and I've always been a massive Cross Purposes fan too. But 1990's Tyr is the biggest grower for me - I want to re-review it, because it's easily an 8/10 for me now. I estimate that I bought my older CD copy of Tyr back in 2011, but I think I've listened to it more in 2024 than I ever have. It's just a tremendous album - Tony Martin's vocals are amazing, Tony Iommi's riffs are as monolithic as ever and Cozy Powell was just a powerhouse of a drummer. Amazing line-up, incredibly underrated era for Sabbath. The biggest curiosity from the boxset however, was the new 2024 remix of 1995's Forbidden. Now, Forbidden was probably always the most unpopular album in Sabbath catalogue - it suffered from the famously botched production. I've liked the album for a number of years. Well, I liked the songs anyway, but even I had to agree Ernie C's original production was weak. Iommi has done wonders with the 2024 remix however. The songs sound amazing now! So much heavier, so much richer!
Anyway, I wrote a detailed blog post about Anno Domini back in June, just days after it dropped. So if you want the juicy details, go read that. In short, I'm a Sabbath fanatic. I love the Tony Martin era just as much as any other era, and I'm glad these brilliant albums are available to buy and stream again. The boxset is amazing, but if you missed out don't worry. They're available to buy separately too. I bought the CD boxset, but I also just got my hands on a vinyl copy of the 2024 Headless Cross remaster. So cool. Also related is the fact I stumbled upon a copy of the 1999 Classic Rock Tyr CD reissue in the wild this year. I paid £7 for it at Dagfields Antiques Centre in Nantwich. Gotta have that! So now I own 3 different CD copies of Tyr!!
2025 PLANS:
Right now I don't have any concerts planned for 2025, other than my usual Bloodstock festival. I got engaged this year and I'm saving for a wedding. That doesn't mean I won't be going to any gigs, but I have priorities and I'm trying to avoid going to any of the pricier arena/stadium-sized concerts. I do regret not buying Iron Maiden tickets for next year. After updating my page, I'd love to see them again. Last time I saw them live was way back in 2014, but it's all absurd resale prices now and I refuse to pay. Ticket prices are already far too expensive as it is. Of course, I still suck it up and pay 'em, but resale tickets are just insane!! I swear to god I paid about £45 to see Maiden in 2011. 13 years on and they've tripled!!
I will no doubt be buying CDs however. Luckily being a music fan doesn't have to be expensive in every respect. I'm hoping to finish the Blind Guardian and Uriah Heep studio discographies next year. I bought a bunch of Blind Guardian albums this year, and I think getting hold of the rest of the ones I don't have already seems doable at a fair price. So I plan to do a page on them when I've gotten them all. Uriah Heep not so much. There's albums like Outsider (2014) and Into the Wild (2011) that for some reason haven't had much (if any) reissues and are crazy expensive to buy. Like I said, I want to have the whole collection, and I'm gonna try to work on getting hold of more Heep albums next year. But whether or not I can get them all at somewhat reasonable prices I don't know.
