The Dead Daisies – Radiance

Here’s a good question and an intriguing conversation starter: If you had a billion dollars, what would you do? I’m sure there’s as many answers for this question as there is dollars in this scenario, and feel free to read yours in the comments. I probably won’t read it, but hey, it doesn’t hurt to converse with fellow dream billionaires. The reason I open this review with this question is because if you’re Australian renaissance man David Lowy, you form a supergroup with all of your favorite rockstars AKA The Dead Daisies.

This isn’t the first time The Daisies have been covered on this site. In fact, it was only a little over a year and a half ago they released their first album with new bassist/frontman Glenn Hughes, Holy Ground. I love how I typed that so casually, as if this is just some other veteran rockstar I’m talking about. Yes people, THEE Glenn Hughes of Deep Purple, Black Sabbath, and Trapeze fame. Hughes inclusion made a lasting impression on the band. They always played a retro 70s driven brand of hard rock, but with Hughes at the helm, soul, finesse, and flair took centerstage, and I ain’t talkin’ Ric.

On their second Hughes fronted effort, Radiance, The Dead Daisies have put together what may be their strongest collection of songs yet. Yes, there are a couple flirtations with active rock redundancy that neither thrill nor disappoint me (“Kiss the Sun”, “Roll On”). Yes, the vast majority of the album follows the verse-chorus-verse-chorus-solo-chorus template, with extra emphasis on the chorus. But if it ain’t broke, why fix it? The point I’m getting at here is even when the songs on Radiance aren’t at their strongest from a songwriting standpoint, it’s the individual performances of each member that make up for it, especially Hughes’ ageless vocals and Doug Aldrich’s tastily ripping solos and riffs akin to Jimmy Page and Paul Kossoff.

Much of Radiance falls somewhere between the soul-drenched, blues hard rock of the early 70s (“Face Your Fear”, “Hypnotize Yourself”) and the anthemic arena rock of the decade’s later half (“Shine On”, “Courageous”). I hope for their sake another old school arena act takes them out for a run soon (looking at you KISS), just so legions of rockers can experience their power in a live setting. And speaking of power, I can’t be the only online metal reviewer who was taken aback by the doom and heaviness of “Radiance”, “Cascade”, and “Not Human”. The overall delivery of these crunchers is more characteristic of doomy hard rock (i.e. Soundgarden, Alice in Chains, 90s Corrosion of Conformity) as opposed to doom metal proper, but they’re still ridiculously heavy considering Glenn Hughes is now *checks the Metal Archives* 71 years old? No, that can’t be right.

It’ll be interesting to see how far The Dead Daisies expands upon this metallic edge in the future. Even if they don’t, for the love of God, Glenn, if you’re reading this, don’t be afraid of doing a traditional doom album on your own, or better yet, with Tony Iommi. You’ve done no wrong for the past 50+ years. There’s no way you could do so now. As for the rest of the Daisies, keep on rockin’ boys! The more hard rock we get that sounds like it’s a half century old, the better.

7 out of 10

Label: Steamhammer

Genre: Hard Rock

For fans of: Black Country Communion, Deep Purple, Free