Well to be honest this one came at us out of nowhere and I’m so glad it did. Over the years there have been some great female voices in Rock and they’ve varied from those artists that you feel could handle everything like Ann Wilson to some very competent but very genre-centric belters. Psycho Kiss’ Helen Ceri has a great Hard Rock voice and the fact that the rest of the band comprising Paul O Brien on lead guitar, Tom Williams on bass, Pete Rose rhythm guitar and Pennfold on drums write a damned fine song makes GRIT an album well worth exploring.
Opener and title track (after the instrumental ‘Ballad of Pennywise’) is a case of best foot forward – foot to the floor Hard Rock with a nod to the past, a great hook and a whole lot of attitude. The lower key ‘Scream Queens’ that follows lays off the pedal a bit and comes with a bluesy smouldering vocal and nice thrust, whilst ‘Sociopathic Superstar’ has a deep grove and swing that shows you can rock hard and be versatile at the same time.
There’s plenty to like here though aside from those solid gold openers:- the moody modern ‘Even Better If’; the storming ‘Devil Inside’ and the enticing sway of ‘Bloodmoon’ rock just as hard; and everything here keeps your attention. They even do the obligatory slow number more than justice: ‘Grieve For You’ has plenty of passion and power to burn.
Hailing from South Wales Psycho Kiss look to have a bright future ahead of them. I can’t see this one getting off the playlist for some time to come!
All in all this is excellent stuff, get out and see them ‘live’ if you can!
