Track Listing

1. Under The Sky
2. Never Too Late
3. Come Follow Me
4. Be What You Want
5. Memphis Water
6. No Questions Asked
7. Into The Gutter
8. Sometimes Your Love
9. Leavin' Today
10. Preachin'
11. Always On Your Mind

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #6713 in Music
• Released on: 2006-06-26
• Number of discs: 1

Customer Reviews

Irish have the Answer!!!!!!!!!
I would love to be the A & R man responsible for finding this fantastic Irish 4 piece. Yes this album smacks heavily of the seventies with a sway towards Zeppelin and Free but with an undescribable modern twist. If your a great band with lots of energy and catchy strong driving anthems like 'never too late' then your record company should be pretty chuffed to have you on board. The Answer are just that : The Answer to some of the mainstream nu metal emo crap that is being passed as music today. They are young ,not dumb and come across as a powerful rock blues british band. Having seen them support Alterbridge a few years back and then seeing them with Whitesnake I was impressed with the difference. The Answer long may you rein.

A classic rock renaissance
If ever we needed a solution to the self consciously stylised over-hyped "art-pop-rock" being peddled in the so-called mainstream music industry, ladies and gentlemen, we have The Answer. Cormac Neeson (vox), Paul Mahon (guitars), Micky Waters (bass), and James Heatley (drums) are four guys hailing from Northern Ireland who grew up listening to their parents' record collection. The result - exuberant Rock music played with guts, power and shedloads of skill that captures perfectly the excitement and joy of the shared experience which is great Rock `n Roll. Yes, their Free and Zeppelin influences shine brightly, but this is no cheap 70's rip off outfit. This is young, fresh, and has more energy than a Jack Russell terrier pup. This is a band that is set to re-energise and revive the blues and take it to a new generation.

Opening track Under The Sky makes a defining statement for the rest of the album. Cormac completely shatters the myth that white men can't sing the blues while Paul exhibits a wonderfully expressive less-is-more approach to blues rock soloing, hardly surprising as his favourite guitarist is Paul Kosoff. One listen through the whole album, and you get it all: explosive drumming, crunching riffs, rolling bass, fluid, resonant playing and hooks that are solid gold. Never Too Late is Zeppelin at their peak, Come Follow Me is 70's flamboyant stadium rock at its best. Memphis Water is a strong dose of "old school" blues rock that displays the band's Free influences, No Questions is an opportunity for James to prove that he can drum like Bonzo, too, and Preachin' has that deep Mississippi delta blues feel, complete with gospel choir to make you feel good about religion again!

The days when the UK was the pioneer for Rock music are long gone, notwithstanding these islands periodically throw up superb bands which epitomise the true sense of rock - Thunder, Little Angels and Skin immediately spring to mind, the latter two having been chewed up and spat out by The Industry, their work becoming nostalgic gems for those of us who "found" them at the time. They way they're going, and with the luck of the Irish behind them, The Answer are surely set to be huge. If you like rock music, this album is a must for your collection.

Not the most original band in the world...
...but then, neither were Led Zeppelin or Free or AC/DC or The Black Crowes, the most obvious influences of this hard rockin' four-piece. As some of my fellow reveiwers have picked up on, they are currently out supporting Whitesnake on their British tour, and audiences up and down the country are loving them. I spoke to lead singer Cormac Neeson in Sheffield after their support slot, and told him that I'd never seen so many people in the crowd watching the support act, and he said he thought Sheffield didn't like them because he'd spotted some empty seats. Anyway, on to the album.

The first track, Under The Sky, is an excellent opener. Short, sharp, punchy lyrics, great guitar work and a heavy rhythm section grabs you by the short and curlies and doesn't let go. Never Too Late and Come Follow Me don't quite have the same impact, though there's nothing wrong with either of them, whilst Be What You Want is one of the band's favourite live tracks, as the three other members of the group get to sing along on the chorus. Memphis Water could be renamed Muddy Waters, it's the first dip of The Answer's toe into the Memphis Blues that they so obviously admire, though for total blues wait until you get to track 10, Preachin'.

And then you're on to the two best songs on the CD - No Questions Asked is pure Led Zeppelin from start to finish, Jimmy Page guitar riffs, Cormac doing his best Robert Plant impression, but there's a feeling of recognition that makes you love it. And the next track, Into The Gutter starts with a Paranoid guitar sound, moves into Bon Scott era AC/DC for the verses (Walk All Over You, that kind of feel), and finishes sounding like the little brother of Aerosmith's Toys In The Attic, but again, you recognise the influences all the way through, and can't help but enjoy it.

One track lets the album down, the closer Always On Your Mind. It's like the last song on the first Darkness album, you can imagine it was written purely to give the listener one of those overblown ballads that you can hold your lighter in the air to, but really, The Answer don't need songs like this. They've got enough sharp rock songs, and emotional bluesy songs, to keep the listener happy, and I for one press fast forward on my CD player once track 10 has finished, and jump to the start of the album again. But apart from that, a marvellous debut album.