Here are Canadian band Emerald Rain operating in the same territory as Harem Scarem.
Written by: gdmonline
ARTIST: Emerald Rain
ALBUM: Age Of Innocence
LABEL: Frontiers
SERIAL: FRCD 037
YEAR: 1999
CD REISSUE: Discogs Reissue List
COUNTRY OF ORIGIN: Canada
LINEUP: Murray Daigle – vocals, guitar, keyboards * Mike Dmitrovic – guitars * Sean Gregory – bass * Kyle Lazenka – drums
TRACK LISTING: 01 No Saviour * 02 Desperate Heart * 03 Never Surrender * 04 Don’t Tell The Rain * 05 Sleeping In The Fire * 06 Endless Grey * 07 Never Let You Go * 08 Barely Holding On * 09 Age Of Innocence * 10 The Method * 11 Come Clean * 12 Your Disguise
Background
If any of you miss the style of melodic rock made popular by Canadians Harem Scarem (forget their later stuff or their new incarnation Rubber), then you could do no worse than shift your base camp to fellow Canadian rockers Emerald Rain.
The Harem Scarem influence is easy to spot, and first came to prominence on Emerald Rain’s debut effort ‘Broken Saviors’. This album went some way to getting the band noticed, and they followed it up with a couple of tours to England with Bob Catley as well as an appearance at the Gods Of AOR festival.
After the ‘Broken Saviors’ album, the band signed a new deal with Now And Then-Frontiers and recruited new drummer Kyle Lazenka, who took over the drum spot from Lorne Boyle. Thus the ‘Age of Innocence’ album. Well, the recipe hasn’t changed a great deal from the first time around, and I suppose why would you want to change the formula? Mike Dmitrovic’s guitar is very much upfront in the mix while Murray Daigle’s vocals are at times a deadringer for Harry Hess.
The Songs
I have to say though that there’s not too much variety throughout, the style, pace and delivery doesn’t change greatly. The rhythm guitar in particular doesn’t appear to have any of it’s settings changed on the effects or the amp through the entire album. For me, there seems to be something missing, like the whole thing needs depth.
The vocal harmonies go some way to rounding it out but I think it needs keyboards to fill it out completely and a bit of spatial atmosphere in the mix. If you recall the first Harem Scarem album you’ll know what I mean. Despite all this, you can tell this band have got something, and some of the songs do stand out, like ‘Never Surrender’, ‘Sleeping In The Fire’ and ‘Endless Grey’.
In Summary
When you get around to album three chaps, think about getting someone else to twiddle the dials and provide an outside perspective. You’ve definitely got the talent and the sound, but to move from a good band to a great band is going to require some changes in approach I think.
