Michael Monroe - Horns and Halos

Three albums into his post Hanoi Rocks career (2^nd phase) and Michael Monroe is looking to close the gap with the past.

Everything has come full circle in the best possible way, and with his band he is redefining the rock and roll landscape again by dragging us all back into the gutter where we can imagine that the stars are within our grasp.

While I was impressed with the debut, and it's proper studio follow up, they are now relegated to being magnificent rungs in the ladder that we stepped on as we made our way to Horns and Halos.

When Ginger moved on to pastures new I mourned his passing right up until it was announced that Dregen was on board, and then I did that dance around the room that you would rather others didn't know about.

The shading he has brought to the material is no better, or worse, than what Ginger brought to the band, just different, and equally as entertaining.

With Sami Yaffa, Steve Conte and Karl Rockfist, and Dregen of course, backing up Michael on stage, in the studio, and on the song-writing this may just be the best band on the planet right now.

In fact you can scratch that.

Right at this moment in time no one is coming close to touching them.

Between them all they have an enviable track record and best of all they have the gang mentality that all great bands need.

Everything has simply clicked into place.

The piano in Child of the Revolution, the guitars in.....well, in everything actually.

It's them against the world and the rest of the world may come in as a poor second in this fight.

There's nothing you could throw at them that they would flinch away from.

They deliver one hundred percent, one hundred percent of the time.

The guitar work dueling back and forth between Steve Conte and Dregen is sublimely and ecstatically fluid.

It's rock and roll nirvana.

Blisteringly good.

There was probably a moment when Sami and Karl were listening back to the album when they looked at each other and smiled knowing that they had built a foundation that was unshakable.

If so, then they were right.

You could build a skyscraper on the back of their input and no storm would topple it.

Michael is the consummate ringmaster throughout.

The icing on the cake.

A glam punk demigod dipping into reggae, clash styled sonic attacks and New York Dolls blues influenced sleaze while barely taking a breath.

Any self respecting rock fan would be in thrall to this.

The frightening thing about it all is that in reality the band are still in their infancy to.

If world domination doesn't materialize then I'm kicking off a revolution as who really wants to live in a world that doesn't celebrate such life affirming music as this?