VELVET THUNDER

We now come to the fourth album by the superior British hard rock band Blood Red Saints and it is something of a case of the return of the prodigal sons as the band initially released the debut album, Speedway, in 2015 on Frontiers before jumping ship to AOR Heaven which saw two further releases with Love Hate Conspiracies in 2018 and Pulse in 2019.

Now back in the Frontiers fold which sees the release of Undisputed, quite simply another remarkable addition to the Blood Red saints very fine discography. The band was initially formed in Manchester in 2014 by Pete Godfrey (vocals) and Rob Naylor (bass guitar) with Lee Revill and drummer Pete Newdeck quickly being added to the roster. Speedway hit the ground running and was a well received hard rock album that put the band very much in the range of those great bands The Distance, FM and Dare plus elements of Harem Scarem and Dokken too. The band developed this classic British rock sound through the next two albums with just a couple of tweaks to the line-up with the personnel on the new album being Pete Godfrey on vocals, Lee Revill on guitar, Rob Naylor on bass and long time member Andy Chemney on drums. The boys have developed a fine rapport and this certainly rubs off on their delivery which is slick and sublime with everyone knowing their jobs to perfection. Pete Godfrey is a national treasure and a vocalist of real talent with Lee Revill as good a guitarist as you are likely to hear and they have a truly tight rhythm section in Andy Chemney and Rob Naylor. Undisputed has all of the typical hard rockers you expect from Blood Red Saints plus several emotion filled power ballads that the band delivers so well.

The British music scene or should that be record charts has been pretty dire for many years but there are still very many fine bands out there and, whilst we may never get back to the days when bands like Judas Priest and Magnum were staples of the British charts, it doesn’t really matter as long as they are out there and still producing quality rock for us all to revel in. If Blood Red Saints is a band that has not previously appeared on your RADAR then you should certainly check them out as they plus bands like Thunder, Ten, Doomsday Outlaw, Inglorious, Vega and very many others are all out there producing very fine albums and they need all the support that they can get and if there is one thing I know it is that the British rock fan supports his bands forever, they are all truly worth it.