Valkyrian Music

Joe Bouchard
Strange Legends
Released 31st July 2020
Hard Rock
Released via Deko Entertainment

‘Strange Legends’ is the latest solo album from the American hard rock artist Joe Bouchard. He is best known as one of the founding members of Blue Öyster Cult. This record features drummer Mickey Curry (Alice Cooper, Bryan Adams) along with lyrical contributions from the the sci-fi writer John Shirley, co-screenwriter for the movie ‘The Crow’.

I have to admit that I’m not too well versed when it comes to Blue Öyster Cult. I am mostly familiar with just two of their songs – ‘Don’t Feat The Reaper’ and ‘Astronomy’ thanks to the Metallica cover. Despite this I decided to give the album a go… So, what we have here are eleven tracks of melodic and uplifting hard rock. The pace is varied but generally speaking the more energetic tracks are mostly in the first half of the record, then Mr. Bouchard mellows things down with a few ballads towards the end.

I enjoyed the guitar parts on African Queen and the chorus is pretty good too. It’s catchy, almost to the point where you are tempted to swing along to the guitar tunes. Speaking of guitars, if you like like jazz style guitar work then you should definitely check out the instrumental Racing Thru The Desert. The guitar riffs are very well done, but personally I’m not so keen on the trumpet noise on the background. Perhaps a little too much like a jazz jamming session for my liking. She’s a Legend is another standout track with a memorable chorus. The overall tone is a little darker thanks to the creepy synthesizer sound in the background. That the doesn’t make the track any less catchy than the others on the album, though. In many ways that song reminded me of some of Blue Öyster Cult’s best known hits.

In summary, ‘Strange Legends’ is a catchy, guitar-driven hard rock album. I enjoyed it despite my limited knowledge of Blue Öyster Cult and Joe Bouchard’s solo work. If you are a fan of Blue Öyster Cult, the chances are that you already have this record. I reckon that most hard rock fans will like it too.

8/10

Iza Raittila

Valkyrian Music

This entry was posted on 8th September 2020 at 1:22 pm and is filed under Review with tags Hard rock, Joe Bouchard. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.