Mystic (label)
03 October 2014 (released)
13 September 2014
I have been listening to ‘The Radium’ (VATA 1st album) since it was released around three years ago and although I have been hearing good things about how the young man’s development is coming along, especially about his guitar and vocal development, I haven’t been able to catch a live show for a long while and I was looking forward to this album intensely. When I then heard that Chris Tsangarides was producing my interest was piqued even more – the man has worked with Gary Moore, Thin Lizzy, Sabbath, Judas Priest – were they moving more into the rock and away from the Blues base of ‘The Radium’?
The answer – yes, and in all sorts of good ways!
Virgil McMahon is an awesomely talented rock guitarist; for a very young man he makes a remarkably soulful noise from riffing and tearing out monster solos but he is all about power and ‘rawwwwk’ and the result is a great noise.
I have always believed that the ideal rock band is a three piece and Virgil is backed up by his (younger!) brother Gabriel and bassist Jack Timmis and they give him a great platform to play from but the undoubted lead is Virgil and he has grown some impressive chops over the last few years.
The opening riff to ‘Blow to the Head’ is classic growling rock but the guitar comes in screaming and howling and when you add that to the menace in his vocals the song takes flight.
‘All Night Long’ powers along like a steamroller – again that monster riff and driving rhythm section and a guaranteed live monster I would guess.
When he does go into a more Bluesey place as he does with ‘Love Aggression’ he shows that his playing is good enough to cope with the softer edge as well and he adds in some proper effects on ‘Through The Night’ without taking away from the song or reducing the impact.
Probably my favourite track is the closer ‘Free’ – lovely organ sound deep in the mix and the song builds to a vaulting Skynrd-meets-the-Eagles-esque monster.
There isn’t a bad track on the album and over nearly an hour I found myself air -guitarring and air-drumming like a mad thing – it’s been a long while cooking but the result is brilliant.
