ROVERS, RAMBLERS AND ROCKERS

ten stellar highlights from Earache Records, including tracks by blackberry smoke, massive Wagons, Rival sons and many more – all in one exclusive compilation.

1 Massive Wagons Sunshine Smile

Comparatively little-known purveyors of rocksolid, groovelicious rock’n’roll from Carnforth (yes, we had to google it too), massive Wagons surprised everyone last month when their album, Full Nelson, hit no.16 in the uK chart. listening to this swaggery stomp of ‘fuck yeah!’ attitude, you can’t help feeling extremely happy for them. Who says proper rock can’t penetrate the masses? Wagons, roll! From Full Nelson www.facebook.com/MassiveWagons

2 Those Damn Crows Blink Of An Eye

meanwhile, over in bridgend, five tattooed guys

(and former school chums of bullet For my Valentine) are sustaining south Wales’ reputation for melodic, heavy-hitting rock built for both clubs and arenas. Blink Of An Eye makes a moody yet moreish first impression – the sort of radio-friendly hard rock that could, if the stars align, take them to some pretty big stages before long. Watch this space. From Murder And The Motive www.facebook.com/thosedamncrows

3 Rival Sons Open My Eyes

Cast your mind back to 2014, and this foursome from long beach, California were laying foundations for what might be termed the new Wave of Classic Rock (there is now actually a Facebook group of this name, with t-shirts and everything), making vintage rock’n’roll tropes sound cooler than they had in years. the band have made plenty of quality music since then, but for our money this track is still one of the best things they’ve ever done. From Great Western Valkyrie www.facebook.com/rivalsons/

4 The Temperance Movement Love And Devotion

another bona fide gem in the world of contemporary classic rock. on a good day (and they do seem to have a lot of them) the temperance movement are hard to beat. this up-tempo highlight from new album A Deeper Cut is testament to this; loose and effortless yet urgent and super-tight (with slide guitar lines cutting through the bridge), it’s easy on the ear in the best way.

From A Deeper Cut www.facebook.com/ TheTemperanceMovement

5 Blackberry Smoke Waiting For The Thunder

bringing the lynyrd skynyrd torch of southern rock’n’roll to team Earache, blackberry smoke have become a firm favourite at Classic Rock hQ. Even when they make it look almost too easy (their live shows are so lovably laid-back they’re practically horizontal) they always seem to conjure shots of urgency like Waiting For The Thunder. taken from their 2016 album Like An

Arrow, this is a ragged, spiky yet sweet shot of bourbon, guitar oomph and luscious organ whirls.

From Like An Arrow www.blackberrysmoke.com/

6 The White Buffalo Dark Days

if you’re thinking a song called Dark

Days from an album called Love And The Death Of Damnation sounds like a pretty frickin’ bleak prospect, that’s because it does. but wait! don’t press ‘skip’! the White buffalo’s (real name Jake smith) palette may be sobering, but his

‘dark country’ brush strokes on this track are rousing, interspersing tough experience with hope. it’s all about putting dark days behind you, or turning lemons into lemonade… or something like that. Either way, it’s very good.

From Love And The Death Of Damnation www.facebook.com/ thewhitebuffalomusic

7 The Glorious Sons Josie

mixing springsteenesque storytelling with big stagefriendly notes of latter-day Kings of leon, Canadian blue-collar rockers the glorious sons (led by two brothers brett and Jay Emmons, along with friends) make the kind of youthful yet worldly music that could conceivably fill stadiums of iPhone-wielding kids and their parents and keep them both happy.

From Young Beauties And Fools www.facebook.com/TheGloriousSons

8 Massive Destination Somewhere

You’d be forgiven for thinking Earache have a thing for bands with ‘massive’ in the title (or that we’ve just gotten really sloppy and half-written ‘massive Wagons’), but these hard-riffing masters of beerdrinking anthems more than earn their place here. they’ll have a brand new album for you to check out in February 2019, but for now enjoy the joyful, no-bullshit title track from their previous record.

From Destination Somewhere www.facebook.com/MassiveOz

9 Danny Worsnop Mexico

he’s a happily engaged man these days, but on this upbeat number (from his nashville-born solo debut), asking alexandria and We are harlot singer danny

Worsnop is all about the laydees. lyrical pearls like ‘watching senoritas

dancing on the beaches’ suggest that dylan’s nobel Prize is more than safe for now, but Mexico delivers more than enough sun-kissed vibes and acoustic-based feelgood fun for us to not really care. Road-trip-ready stuff to keep you singing through the last of the decent weather. From The Long Road Home www.facebook.com/ officialdannyworsnop

10 Haggard Cat Boneshaker

our audio tour of the Earache vaults concludes with two noisy dudes (both formerly of hardcore band hECK) describing themselves as “White stripes Wannabe bullshit hipster Pseudo Rock”. Which is a wry if slightly harsh description.

Boneshaker is a much more brutal, face-breaking affair than any notion of hipster-ism (or White stripesevoking) might imply, channelling their aggressive past into a riffed up new framework. From Challenger www.facebook.com/HaggardCat