I love my 70’s Glam more than most and whilst in these eyes at least, the names of Slade and The Sweet loom far larger than that of Suzi Quatro, you have to applaud Suzi for keeping the flame going all these years (and I can attest she does put on a great live show). So here they are, on the face of it a 70’s Glam rock supergroup, though of course neither Powell nor Quatro ever really penned anything of real note and Scott sadly was always in the shadow of that song writing machine – Nicky Chinn and Mike Chapman (who occasionally gave the odd lesser track to Quatro after the initial novelty wore off).
Expectations then weren’t too high and indeed the old time ‘Boogie-woogie’ of opener ‘Slow Down’ is nothing more than ‘nice’, and the sick horns even a little twee. In truth the more laid back ‘Long Way From Home’ is far batter, though it does suffer from sounding rather tentative. A beefier production might have worked wonders.
The first of a number of covers comes in the form of ‘Tobacco Road’ that vintage rocker by The Nashville Teens that has been covered by countless artists. It’s a decent cover and hits surprisingly hard, relatively speaking.
The rest of the album is a mix of covers and originals, and too be honest its hard to see this as anything other than a nice get together to play a few covers that grew legs and saw a few new songs birthed. None of the new stuff is truly horrible, but there’s a lukewarm feeling about much of the material here from the Meatloaf/Steinman-lite ‘If Only’ to the rather safe take on Elvis’ ‘Little sister’.
There are exceptions of course: the QSP version of ‘The Price of Love’ is a nice chugging rock take on The Everly Brothers original, and the ballad ‘Pain’ gets an orchestral and a band take and as the stand-out song probably deserves it. Personally, I prefer the new Sweet material Scott is still producing these days as this album sounds more in line with Quatro’s sound than The Sweet or Slade.
The one song were they could have pushed it – the Dr John song popularised by Humble Pie, ‘I Walk on Guilded Splinters’ never really catches light like it should. One for the fans.
Tracklist: 1. Slow Down 2. Long Way from Home 3. Tobacco Road 4. If Only 5. Bright Lights Big City 6. Pain (Orchestral) 7. Just Like a Woman 8. Mend a Broken Heart 9. The Price of Love 10. Broken Pieces Suite 11. I Walk On Gilded Splinters 12. Late Nights Early Flights 13. Little Sister 14. Pain (Band Version) (Bonus Track)
