NIGHTVISION
As The Lights Go Down
Rocksector 2009



Well it seems straight up heavy melodic old school rocking is definitely on the up in the UK these days which is a good thing of course no? Well as long as the quality remains high then the more the merrier I say. Well we can now add sleepy Lincolnshire's, Nightvision to the list of young hard rockers donning their leathers and cranking out big time foot-on-the-monitor straddling rock and roll.

These guys are mere whippersnappers but they know which side their bread's buttered on when it comes to rocking out. Earthy, ballsy, groovy, melodic and catchy are some of the adjectives that wouldn't be out of place describing their debut release. The sound of the record is based around heavy and pounding no frills riffing - both midpaced and slightly faster - whilst allowing vocalist Dave McKee to croon and grate his melodies over the top. He's a decent singer for a young fellow though perhaps with plenty of room for improvement but he doesn't let his band mates down in any way at all. He has a slightly bluesy, whiskey soaked style that is not far from some bands like the singer in Black Stone Cherry who peddles a similar style. In fact Nightvision could be the UK's answer to some of the US's hard rocking heavy and melodic bands and they more than hold their own.

You can tell that the sound of the band is geared for live performance and nothing else. Some of the energy of the band is robbed on a piece of plastic but you can just imagine them going down quite a storm on a bill of heavy hard rock somewhere in a sweaty little dive in the middle of nowhere! The band's songwriting is pretty cool although they need to work on some of the choruses but they already have the riffs to back it up no problem. This is a really decent album and more than got my head nodding along on more than one occasion. The production is heavy and standard without much sonic dexterity but that's not really called for in a band like this but given a bigger budget they can polish some of the rough edges a little more.

These young Lincoln boys are steeped in the British hard rock tradition and have schooled well as far as music is concerned. There is still a fair way to go to gain recognition as this type of music is just not that popular however much of a comeback rock is making these days. They still need to work on their songwriting abilities to add bigger, room filling chorus work to make them stand out from the crowd. However the ingredients are fully in place, but in order to make the perfect cake you need just the right egg mix and to sift the flour finely, plus the right oven temperature to make the perfect sponge. Although Nightvision are already are already a step ahead of your 'Battenburgs' and your 'Cup Cakes' if you excuse my rather lame analogy! Overall an enjoyable rock record by these youngsters with the undoubted foundations for further improvement and development undeniable.

© Pirage Forsi
Rating ***1/2 (3.5/5.0)

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