Alan Lennon "Heaven's Call" - virtuoso guitar-rock album from 2003!

Hi all, Jason here! I know that I have said in the last few posts that there would be no more lulls in my posting on "Nightchillers Rare Music", but to put it bluntly: I went on a vacation in late Summer, and ever since then I have been practicing drums & guitar at home inbetween the spaces of running a business 9-5 Monday thru Friday. I also re-installed 32-bit & 64-bit OS's onto this, my home system. I have regreted letting the blog suffer but it IS important for me to have some steady life in the blog and I promise I'll inject it back in!

Here is the inspirational, all instrumental rock album from guitar virtuoso Alan Lennon entitled "Heaven's Call" from 2003. This is his 1st sort of E.P. length album that has been highly praised all over the world. It is very rare and has been unavailable to find for a few years now. I think I first heard it in 2006 and it is one of my favorite instrumental guitar records with its' melody-before-technique compositon. Young Alan from Ireland, has played with some of the biggest shredders in the world and he has astounding skill on the guitar. These songs are soo original with such a giant stature of beauty that your granpa, dog & girlfriend will all be really impressed! Soft & heavy, hard & light, new age, rock, neo-classically shredded sections, etc. are some words to describe it. Click on the hidden download link and enjoy!

Alan Lennon "Heaven's Call"

"The Story:

Influenced by such stellar musicians such as Shawn Lane, Jeff Beck and Jason Becker, Irish guitarist Alan Lennon has released "Heaven's Call", an EP/CD featuring melodic shred and atmospheric hard rock that is an inspirational listen. As Lennon himself states, "With my music I always try to put the songs before the technique. If a song does not need any fast technical playing, I won't put any in. What good is music if it is not nice to listen to? I think it is important that your music is accessible to people who don't play guitar." With that in mind, some songs do lend themselves to technical playing, as the blazing fretfest "Cherry Bomb" illustrates with its balls-to-the-walls-sound - and you'll be impressed with Lennon's command of the fretboard."

The Music:

Setanta (Part One) 4:35
Bruce 2:12
Pure Vida 4:01
Ode To Becker 4:49
Kate Angel 1:50
Cherry Bomb 2:48
Night Skies 4:29
Setanta (Part Two) 3:07

+ 2 tracks added:

Amaya (full song demo) 5:19

Little Wing 4:16

The Artists:

Alan Lennon - Guitars, Production,
Shane McCullagh - Bass
Bryan Walsh - Drums
Richard McCullagh -Engineering, Keyboards, Soundscapes
Aidan Foley - Mastering
Mattias Noren - Artwork, Design

"Dr. Mastermind": another metal classic with "Deen Castronovo" on drums from 1986

Hi everyone. Here's the second metal album that I'm sharing in promise of them appearing occasionally. I bring you: "Dr. Mastermind" from 1986 (the 1st metal release on the unearthly virtuoso music label "Shrapnel Records"!). This is the infamous former singer of "The Wild Dogs","Matt McCourt", as he left to do this album - while "The Wild Dogs" got a new bassist & singer and made their 3rd album "Reign Of Terror" (the 1st metal album I shared with you). Yet, the genius prodigy drummer "Deen Castronovo" plays on "Reign Of Terror" & "Dr. Mastermind" (a trio). McCourt is your doctor, and he does all of the singing & rips on the bass. The astounding guitarist is the infamous "Kurt James" - searing, tapping & shredding. Kurt later dropped out of the scene to go to Spain and study the bass in the path of deceased virtuoso "Jaco Pastorius". He has recently returned to the states and recorded new shred guitar material with McCourt.

"Dr. Mastermind" will blow your doors and you guys will have fun with this one. I do multimedia production for a living and I added the 1st song "Domination" to a 19 year-old college fullback's highlight scouting tape along with some other music and he loved it! The doctor will see you now...heh...heh...heh...

This album is available from CDBaby.com as a rare re-release. So if you're convinced, and I know you are, go pay the paltry amount for the CD and crank it up!

"Wild Dogs" - "Reign Of Terror": A 1987 metal masterpiece

Here's my first rare & obscure metal masterpiece album post - everyone download this, even if you don't listen to metal. It's especially for my friend "The Phelpster" from "The Manchester Morgue" who has posted some metal classics in between the film music on his blog.

This is the 3rd album release from the "Wild Dogs" from 1987: "Reign Of Terror" (7 additional demos recorded for the followup album never transpired - I didn't include them because their quality's pretty bad) which introduced a new lead singer & bassist. The 1st two "Wild Dogs" albums are great as well but this is the best one. All of the songs were written by the phenomenal guitarist "Jeff Mark" & the famous pioneer drumming virtuoso "Deen Castronovo". Jeff rules & Deen has been one of the most sought after journeyman drum wizards of all time as he has played on numerous metal & neo-classical metal albums, as well as non-metal releases for a wide range of artists including, Tony MacAlpine, Steve Vai, Marty Friedman, Cacophony, Social Distortion, Ozzy Osbourne, etc. He is now the drummer for Journey. Deen also plays on the former "Wild Dogs" singer "Matt McCourt's" project from 1986 called "Dr. Mastermind" - this is also an absolute metal masterpiece classic from "Shrapnel Records" that I will post on this blog soon as well.

"What Hendrix, Van Halen and Ywngwie were to modern guitar Deen is to drums. His over the top bombastic bass drum flurries soon made Deen the 16 YR OLD wonder kid of his band at the time. "The Enemy" went out as the opening act in front of Blue Oyster Cult and Foghat. Upon seeing an ad on TV for The Enemy, Kip Doran (Evil Genius), Matt McCourt and Ja Reynolds (Malice ) went to see Deen at a local nightclub. "He was playin' double bass in parts of "Shoot, Shoot" the UFO song, that actually made me like that song", remembers McCourt. "I was really into drummers especially Billy Cobham and Neil Peart and here is this (then) overweight kid takin' up the whole stage playing and singing, the others in the band had to stand on the dance floor because his kit was so big."

Here is another quote from Matt McCourt about the "Wild Dogs" and this 3rd release: "The Wild Dogs emerged in the nwobhm at the same time Metallica, Slayer, Metal Church, Iron Maiden, and Saxon came onto the scene. Signed to Shrapnel Records, they possesed drummer Deen Castronovo who has recorded with Ozzy Osbourne and Journey, and guiatrist Jeff Mark who styles himself after Eddie Van Halen and Uli John Roth of the Scorpions. He is a truly unique and innovative guitarist who if comparison HAS to be made I would say along the lines of Alex Lifeson in theory and originality and Uli Jon Roth for the speedy riffs. This was Mike Varney of Shrapnel Record's first real discovery long before the neo-classical invasion. This album was composed by Deen Castronovo and Jeff utilizing the world class drumming that prior releases did not contain. A drummers handbook of riffs and the notuion that drummers too can write songs! In an effort to be different this album definitely is not puppy mill speed metal and fits in with Racer X , or the other vocal based groups of this genre. You'll notice a few similarities on the production of "Dr. Mastermind", also released at this time. 16 months later Deen was picked up by Tony MacAlpine and shortly thereafter began his long career with Neal Schon, and became a member of the supergroup Journey. "Reign Of Terror" contains a highly modern prog rock approach to American metal. The album has been deemed a classic must own for budding drummers and guitarsits as a riffateria often inspiring talent."

Well there you go, that should get you salivating for some rare metal masterpieces to follow folks as I include some more revies here n' there between the film scores & soundtracks.

This album is available from CDBaby.com as a rare re-release. So if you're convinced, and I know you are, go pay the paltry amount for the CD and crank it up!