For many years I’ve had a bit of a thing for old bands from Holland. For example the likes of Bodine, Vengeance, Helloise, Elegy and of course more recently the great Arjen Lucassen and his various projects such as Star One as well as his solo stuff.
Now to add Zinatra to that list. I’d not heard of them prior to seeing a post somewhere a few days ago which was about Zinatra’s album The Great Escape from 1990 being remastered and reissued by Bad Reputation Records with some bonus tracks.
On reading they were from Holland – I bought it for that reason only. A smart decision as it turns out…..
Zinatra came and went with little fanfare making only two albums with the Great Escape being the second and final one. But what a banger it is.
Superior hard-edged melodic rock with outstanding guitar from Gino Rerimassie and huge soaring vocals from Joss Mennen.
And with this being 1990, as was the style at the time, there are lots of keyboards and whatnot – which compliment the songs rather than overpower them as some did.
Throw in more hooks than you can count and on this album Zinatra deliver a fresh, upbeat and massively enjoyable album which, despite how good it is, garnered little attention.
The short instrumental lead in explodes in to Take it to the Top. A towering slice of punchy melodic rock with the crisp riff backed up by the soaring keys, equally soaring vocals and hook, big drums and check out the solo. What an attention grabber.
There She Was is impossibly catchy. Unknown Skies and Candy Man go heavier as does Jekyll and Hyde. Each one squarely hitting the spot with Rerimasse letting rip riffing and chugging away when he’s not tearing up and down the fretboard.
The closer of The Roaring Silence with the acoustics giving way to the electrics at mid-point turn it in to one which is pure “arena rock” demanding many Zippos to be upheld.
The only blip for me is the overly sugary generic power ballad of Hold On. Otherwise The Great Escape is, er, great!
The four bonus tracks here on the reissue are all similarly top notch.
Think say a combination of period Journey, Europe, Touch and UFO in their Misdemeanour days. That’s what Zinatra achieve here. It’s marvellous.
>> ZINATRA THE GREAT ESCAPE ON AMAZON <<
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