D'ercole - 'Made To Burn'

(Rock Company Records)

‘Made To Burn’ is the fifth album from D’Ercole – the collaboration between multi-instrumentalist / vocalist Phil Vincent and guitarist Damian D’Ercole. I have a lot of respect for Phil Vincent and his song writing, I tend to really enjoy the vast majority of his songs and appreciate his vocals. The D’Ercole albums stand up to the quality of his other bands and solo work and ‘Made To Burn’ is no exception. If you’re already a fan of the band or indeed anything involving Vincent than this will definitely please you.

On my first causal listen I enjoyed the album but felt it wasn’t as impressive as some of Vincent’s other recent output. When I returned to the album for a proper listen as I started my review I found the songs more intriguing than my first impression implied and with multiple spins I found the songs really getting under my skin. It didn’t take long for ‘Made To Burn’ to really start impressing me and is definitely one of Vincent’s strongest albums to date and maybe the best D’ercole one!

As you expect with many of Vincent’s releases he’s not afraid to mix it up and offer variation with his songs. The ever-present Beatles influence rears its head on the album closer ‘Don’t Know What You’ve Got’ albeit in a slightly less prominent way as I’ve heard before. Here the main mix is between full bloodied hard rockers and songs with strong early AOR touches, along the lines of Chicago and other piano lead bands from that era. These softer songs are accompanied by raw edged guitars which modernises the impact and beefs up the hard edge as some of these songs could just as easily be recorded as pop songs given the strong melodies.

Vincent puts in a really strong vocal performance on this album, one his best yet check out ‘Time To Walk Away’ for a prime example of Vincent’s voice it it’s best. I also enjoyed the raw and prominent guitars which give these songs a D’Ercole stamp and identity.

Album standout’s you should check out are ‘Feel The Burn’ which has an insistent chorus and really gets under your skin, the powerful and immediate rocker ‘Time To Walk Away’ and the early AOR sounding duo of ‘Out Of Time’ and ‘Open Your Eyes’.

Another quality release involving Vincent and highly recommended!

8/10

Essential Track - 'Time To Walk Away'

Review by Woody