PRIDE OF LIONS – Pride Of Lions

Pride of Lions is a new project with Jim Peterik, former Survivor member, as main man. Along with him he has got a singer named Toby Hitchcock with whom Peterik shares the vocal duties.

It you want to celebrate melodic power rock from the 80s (give and take some years…), this is the record for you. Melodic power rock stuck in the past, that is. The keyboard sounds are worryingly old fashioned, and the drums are even from time to time sounding like electronic drums! (E.g. track 9, “Madness of Love”) And all the tracks are sadly over arranged… If you, after listening to this, still want more, if you are tired of your old Asia, Foreigner, Boston, and Journey records, Pride of Lions is good news for you.

Believe me; Toby Hitchcock’s voice is phenomenal! but the setting is wrong. The songs should rather be performed live in a musical on London’s West-end. E.g. track three, “Interrupted Melody”, would fit a Broadway musical much better than something meant to be a rock record. Or… maybe Jim Peterik intended to create a rock + musical fusion. Maybe. However, this album is full of the biggest cliches and parodies of both genres.

Believe me; I love strong melodies and powerful voices! Throwing in a keyboard here and there won’t make me sad, but every composition on this record is just so extremely OVERCALCULATED! And this is my point: Pride of Lions sure wants to nail you to your seats, but fails as their total lack of soul makes you, at least me…, totally untouched. It is sterile, impersonal and something you’ve hear hundreds of times before ( a long, long time ago… ). The musicians are sure clever and they are working hard, but they sounds programmed, especially the guitar runs. On “First Time around the Sun” they are flirting a bit with funk, but except from that this record hardly holds any form of experimental performances. These are lions in cages.

In one of the record’s power ballads, “Unbreakable” (with a rhythm guitar working on a riff unpleasantly close to the one of “Eye of the Tiger”), Hitchcock sings over and over again: «I am, I am, I am unbreakable!» Please! Stop it! We are all leaves in the wind…

(You better spend your money on Disney’s The Lion King which I just saw has been released for the first time on DVD in Europe. When it comes to entertaining that movie does more justice to the big cats of Serengeti than Pride of Lions.)