Neverland

Description

2009 album from this melodic Hard Rock band featuring extraordinary vocalist Michele Luppi. Michele cut his teeth at the VIT Los Angeles, with Robin Randall (co-writer of hits for FM, Mark Free, James Christian) as one of his musical coaches. He teamed up with bass player and producer Fabrizio Grossi (Glenn Hughes, From The Inside, Vertigo) to give birth to a project that would allow him to express his Melodic Rock roots.

Reviews

Rating: 4 / 5
Date: 2010-08-04
Summary: "Very friendly AOR featuring Michele Luppi, Fabrizio Grossi, Eric Ragno and Tommy Denander"

`Los Angeles' is the AOR project built around bass player/composer Fabrizio Grossi (`Starbreaker') and vocalist Michele Luppi (ex-`Vision Divine'). `Neverland' is the second album to come out of the project released in 2009. What perhaps needs to be clear is that `Los Angeles' stands apart from the hard rock/metal sound of the previously mentioned bands; as a matter of fact this project is AOR and fairly reserved at that. The line up of `Los Angeles' is completed by melodic rock keyboard extraordinaire Eric Ragno (`China Blue'), guitarists Tommy Denander and Joey Sykes, plus drummer Tony Morra.

As mentioned previously most of these personalities have become synonymous with Arena rock and overblown AOR therefore one has to insist that `Neverland' is significantly restrained in terms of performance: Mid tempo dominates the biggest part of the album, demonstrating also a fair amount of slower tunes; the guitar riffs and rhythms are nowhere upfront, simply underlining each song's passages while the keyboards carry the melodic lines for the biggest part.

I have to say I expected more hot rocking AOR/melodic track yet evidently this is not what this project is set out to do. On that count `Neverland' offers a good amount of soft but memorable and enjoyable tunes including `Nothing to hide', `Tonight tonight' and living inside.

Overall if you are a fan of light AOR, `Los Angeles' is an ideal candidate for anyone wanting to enjoy rock melodies and memorable choruses without going too heavy.

Rating: 5 / 5
Date: 2010-01-20
Summary: "Amazing album filled with great vocals!"

I find it hard to get into most AOR/melodic rock albums released lately because they seem to forget the importance of great vocal melodies and guitar. The latest album from Los Angeles has great vocal melodies and guitar in every track. Michelle Luppi gives an amazing performance on this album and there isn't a single bad track. Grab this if you can and support great music.