Well fuck my old boots, it’s been a truly incredible year for rock music.
Who could have possibly imagined, back in the wilderness years from ’94 to even 2003 or so that I could be writing an end-of-year rock review here in 2008 which encompasses storming brand new albums from Extreme, Whitesnake, AC/DC, Metallica, The Quireboys, Mötley Crüe, and even… yes, who would have dared to even dream it, Guns N’ Roses. What is this, 1991 again? Seems so, and I love it.
What follows here, then, is my rundown of all the decent rock and metal albums to have graced my ears and collection from 2008 - that is albums released in 2008, which is why Airbourne’s “Runnin’ Wild”, Crashdiet’s “The Unattractive Revolution” and VR’s “Libertad” don’t make the list, awesome though they are. (There are 17 mini-reviews coming at you, so you may want to fetch a beer or such before you dig in – this is going to be a long post.)
Some might think I’ve been pretty generous with my ratings, but bear in mind all these albums are here because I like them, or else I wouldn’t be reviewing them. I’m not doing this for a job, or being sent things to review, so you’re unlikely to see any 1 or 2 star ratings. All albums are marked out of 5 stars (though I reserve the right to use half stars) and I can tell you that out of them all, there is only one to which I have awarded the full 5. (I guess I’ll save that one for last, actually. If you don’t like suspense you can happily scroll down…)
I shall take the rest in alphabetical order by band/artist, which brings me first of all to…