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Nitrate: Feel The Heat
Nitrate: Feel The Heat
Melodic Hard Rock/AOR
5.0/5.0
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Frontiers Music
Words: Craig Hartranft
Added: 11.10.2023 | Released: 13.10.2023
The last I heard from UK's Nitrate, founded by bass player and principal songwriter Nick Hogg, was their second album, Open Wide, in 2019. In 2021, amidst the COVID pandemic, Hogg and company dropped, Renegade, which brought more personnel changes: new vocalist Alexander Strandell on vocals, Tom Martin on rhythm guitars, and James Martin on keyboards. Two years on once more, Nitrate returns with their latest and fourth long player, Feel The Heat, now returning to the Frontiers label. The new album includes new personnel (what a surprise): Richard Jacques on guitar and Alex Cooper (Devilfire, Corvus) on drums.
Nitrate
Personnel shifts aside, Nitrate still delivers AOR-inspired melodic hard rock, straight from the Eighties era. Honestly, listening to a Nitrate album sounds like a soundtrack to a Richard Donner or John Hughes film. The songs would be appropriate for that former's action films or the latter's dorky teen rom-com films. From rockers to romance.
Largely, this comes from Hogg's songwriting formula: strong song melody and harmony from brisk guitar riffs and lush, soaring vocal arrangements, hooks in rock rhythm and groove and catchy refrains, bright synth embellishment and, of course, bristling guitar solos. Hogg knows his Eighties sound, and he' probably half the age of those of us who attended that classic era.
Brisk catchy rockers arrive with Live Fast Die Young, All The Right Moves, Wild In The City, and Strike Like A Hurricane. Add any to your nostalgic (action or rom-com) film homage to the Eighties. For Hughes, Jon Cryer, Anthony Michael Hall, and Molly Ringwald, you can add the AOR rockers Needs A Little Love, One Kiss To Save My Heart (featuring Issa) and, most definitely, Stay, the concluding anthemic ballad.
All considered, and once more, Feel The Heat demonstrates that Nick Hogg and Nitrate are masters at creating classic AOR melodic hard rock. So much so, these songs could have been a soundtrack for that famous era. Definitely recommended.
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The Take Away
Once more, Feel The Heat demonstrates that Nick Hogg and Nitrate are masters at creating classic AOR melodic hard rock. So much so, these songs could have been a soundtrack for that famous era. Definitely recommended.
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