MINIMUM VITAL is certainly amongst the most original bands from the Eighties Progressive rock scene: twin brothers Thierry & Jean-Luc PAYSSAN mix art-rock influences from YES, guitar parts as fluid as Mike OLDFIELD's, an amazing virtuosity coming from jazz-rock fusion, many innovations and a deep mark from medieval and southern European traditional musics. This French band has built its own style, marked by a huge identity and originality, and is now recognized as a reference in itself. ""Envol Triangles/Les Saisons Marines"" gathers the first audio-Cassette (1985) and the first vinyl (1987). Beautiful album recorded on the Musea label, ""Sarabandes"" (1990) reflects the strong personality of the band. MINIMUM VITAL is not far from equalling masters such as YES or CAMEL. ""La Source"" (1993) sees the inclusion of female singer Sonia NEDELEC and her counterpart Jean-Baptiste FERRACCI. They use a language of her own, melting Latin, Occitan (A dialect from the South of France) and Portuguese. The live video ""Les Mondes De..."" allows to understand better the strange attraction that charmed the American audience, reputedly very demanding, during the 51 minutes that the Los Angeles' ProgFest 1994 performance lasted. It comprises pieces from the three first albums, as well as unreleased tracks. ""Esprit D'Amor"" (1997) is a complete renewal of the genre, letting the usual apart. ""Au Cercle De Pierre..."" (1997) allows the listener to appreciate the charisma and the energy of the band on stage. The CD includes twelve titles, two of them being unreleased (One studio track), and is completed by a multimedia part (With biography, music and video). After a seven-year silence, so hard to stand even with the VITAL DUO experience, MINIMUM VITAL is eventually back with a new studio opus. ""Atlas"" (2004) continues the same way, bettering its style. The seventh opus ""Capitaines"" seems to be back to the source (Pun intended !). Sometimes instrumental, often sung, these nine pieces are faithful to MINIMUM VITAL's own musical style. With a strong work on percussion, including unusual and ethnic sounds, the band succeeds in creating a well-balanced music, melodious, including tracks among the best the band composed so far, like ""Capitaines"", ""La Croix De Bourghi Bandô"" or ""La Route"". A timeless music, composed and played with a strong desire for perfection. ""Chapître 3"" (Musea Parallele, 2012) is the first DVD ever published by the band, captured live March 4th, & 5th, 2011, at Begles' Mussonville Chapel. The two brothers are busy playing guitars, keyboards and percussions on the six titles featured here. Far from being lost, Thierry & Jean-Luc PAYSSAN, accompanied by bass player Eric REBEYROL, perform top-notch music with class and elegance. Three other compositions, recorded in February 2012, are featured as bonus. Be sure that this third chapter opening shall be as thrilling as the previous ones !

One year after his great debut album The Lights Of A Distant Bay, the Polish musician Kamil Konieczniak (keyboards, guitars, bass, loops) surprised me again with a fine album called Soul's Inner Pendulum (2009, see review), both released under the moniker of Moonrise. Especially for people who like neo-progressive rock this album feels like a warm bath. Beside Konieczniak the strong and high-levelled compositions on this second album were recorded by the fabulous Millenium singer Łukasz Gall, saxophonist Dariusz Rybka, guitarist Marcin Kruczek and drummer Grzegorz Jakiela.

Shy were a British metal band formed in 1980 under the name "Trojan", hailing from Birmingham, England.

Slayer - американская метал-группа. Коллектив был основан в 1981 году гитаристами Джеффом Ханнеманом и Керри Кингом в Хаунтингтон Парк, Калифорния. Slayer возглавила музыкальное движение американского трэш-метала после выпуска своего альбома Reign in Blood (1986), который считается лучшим достижением группы и «классикой трэш-метала». Вместе с группами Metallica, Megadeth и Anthrax Slayer составляет «большую четвёрку трэш-металла».

Первый альбом талантливого французского мультиинструменталиста Максима Дефранка, чувствуется влияние на его музыку таких грандов как Pink Floyd & Eloy.

No Doubt is the fifteenth studio album of the Christian rock band, Petra. It was released on August 26, 1995.
The tone of the album is more pop-oriented than any previous release featuring Schlitt. Most of the rock songs lack the driving edge of their previous albums, and the sonic field is no longer flooded with distorted guitars, leaning more toward a calculated, radio-friendly sound.
All the guitars in the album were played by founder Bob Hartman. However, since he had quit touring with the band before the release of the album, new guitarist David Lichens was enlisted to travel with the band and appeared in the album art and promotional pictures.
The album also featured another new member, keyboardist Jim Cooper. Cooper was a keyboard technician for former keyboardist John Lawry for several years. When Lawry retired, Cooper replaced him.

You are now imagining / remembering the classic melodic Rock revolution of the 1980s. A long lost age when SURVIVOR, FOREIGNER and JOURNEY ruled the earth, along with their tales of everything vaguely related to love. PRIDE OF LIONS is the direct descendant of these three bands.
The first song on the album “Immortal” is a powerful statement of intent about how AOR will never die, I agree, it’s far too commercially viable to die. While the first song is catchy, powerful and the riffs are actually pretty damn heavy, the second song is total commercial Rock standard fare; elevated from mediocrity only because of Hitchcock’s amazing voice. Despite this it needs to be said that the lyrics in this album are a huge step forward from the normal heartbroken love ballads of the 80s.